( OPEN ) GAME START.

[monstermasher]

▶ WHO: Everyone.
▶ DATE: July 9th, 2015 (Day 1)
▶ WARNINGS: Blood, violence, general zombie horror.
▶ SUMMARY: You've met with a bad... however that line goes. Welcome to Earth.

GOOD MORNING!

---

Please try and ignore whatever it is that you just heard. It should only last for up to a minute... maybe.

It... it is morning, right?

There are no windows.

There's a light, but it's barely considered one. The compound runs on a solar generator, but that doesn't mean it has a lot of power. The light seems to be hanging from the ceiling, swinging precariously. That's when you might actually start to wake up, sit up, find the things that are familiar to you... and then some of the things that aren't. It'd be wise to explore the small room you're in before leaving through the steel door, but there's nobody around to tell you that.

Outside is a tightly knit compound, just as dark and metallic as the room. The hallway you're in houses dozens more doors identical to yours, and if you're unlucky there may be more people poking their heads out through them, just like you. There's a dull glowing sign that reads MEDICAL BAY but not all of you remember being hurt. Some of you may be just fine, apart from the memory of the sound you heard when waking up.

The Medical Bay is stocked with enough medicine to last a couple of months. There's almost everything that can be found in a hospital. Somebody was thinking ahead.

Outside of the Medical Bay are more doors, some are even locked—many aren't. There are living quarters, a food storage, a kitchen, some laboratories; even a room full of computers and nothing else, all with a screen asking for a password. There's only two doors out of the compound, a vehicle bay with what appear to be a few military jeeps and trucks, and the front doors. It's on the inside of the front doors that something is painted in bright red, flecked with what smell like blood:

DO NOT GO OUTSIDE WITHOUT A GUN AND WATER.
GUNSHOTS ATTRACT THEM.
HOLLOWS IS 1.3 MILES NORTH OF HERE.
GOOD LUCK.

And on the outside of the doors, if you choose to open them:

THE WORLD ENDED JULY 3RD, 2015.

Now... how long ago was that? And where is this place? Luckily for you, Hollows is a small town that can be raided. It hasn't been too long since the apocalypse—surely you'll be able to find something there. Batteries, food, weapons, maybe some people—and what you're guaranteed to find. Them, whatever that means.

Outside of the compound there's a fence with a single gate. Nothing can get past this unless you let them in for tea, so be careful. There's a shooting range and a large shed full of weapons and ammo, enough to last two months if you're careful. Guns, knives, anything that would be used by the military and police is hidden away in the shed. There are even a few hunting bows with arrows.

If you climb up the ladder to the top of the wall, there's enough room to walk along the top. There's definitely something moving in the distance, something you should definitely be worrying about. Maybe it's time to get a good look with a sniper rifle...?

Oh.

It's gone.

Maybe it was just a trick of the light. Regardless, it's impossible for everyone to stay in the compound forever. There are nefarious things at work! The choices are to go to Hollows, stick around, or go somewhere else. Really, the world is almost a blank slate. Maybe more of a used slate, but still yours to explore.

When the night comes, you should be hiding. The screamers, the ragers, whatever the hell they are, are running full tilt through the streets and across the landscape, running through anything in their way, ripping apart anything alive. If you don't make any noise, they won't notice you. Especially since they're stuck listening to each other. But if you get noticed by one, it won't be long until a horde forms... you might be able to outrun one for awhile, but they don't seem to let up on their breakneck pace. Maybe someone should have told you how to kill them.

OOC NOTES.

---

There will be zombies in Hollows. Whether you meet them on the way there is up to you. Apart from the undead and the animals (maybe somebody should let those poor creatures out of their houses) the town is completely deserted. In fact, the closest thing you can find to a human are the bodies of those who died without being bitten, and there's even few of those. You can find anything you'd find in a normal town here, and are free to loot and raid the houses and stores—the cops won't be coming, after all. The power is OFF apart from what you can find that is solar powered or still has a charge. If you're lucky and find another town while exploring the first few weeks, you might find an area that still has power—thank hydroelectricity.

Just keep in mind travel time... and travel expenses.

You have creative freedom over everything else. The world is open. The only stationary places are landmarks and cities—if you want to go to Texas and talk to the poor astronauts stranded up in space, it's there. (Might be a long trip, though...)

If your character can figure it out by geography before getting to Hollows, the compound is located a few hours from the west coast, in California.

The way to kill a zombie is blunt force to the head. The head doesn't need to be removed, but significant damage needs to be done to it. This does not include the throat—it needs to be a headshot.

There's also a glaring hint. The computers in the compound, asking for a password. It is impossible to hack at this time. There will be more on this later!

Finally, if your character is exploring outside of the compound (or extensively inside of it) there's a comment here for linking me the thread. You can also PM me! I'll be ducking in with what your character may or may not have found, via a response to the actual RP thread.

IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS please direct them here!

Comments

peggy carter | ota | prose or brackets welcome!

[mucked]

-- In the immediate moment following Agent Carter's departure from her strange new quarters (if they can be called that), her first act is to remove her shoes. The well-made kitten heels are simply too loud with every strike they make upon the compound's floor, and she isn't interested in alerting the whole damned place in her every movement. For now, she walks carefully with the backs of her shoes hooked over her fingers. And in her other hand? A long and sinister looking horn, poached from God knows what manner of animal. Certainly none she knows. After an unfortunate mishap with the only other makeshift weapon left to her (a damp umbrella) was ruined, this horn is her one thin defence against...whatever the hell might be outside. Or inside -- after all, what spurs her onwards but the sobs and cries she heard upon waking?

But before she can even begin to consider her sortie, she must do something about this pencil skirt. Something else about the stocking'd feet she now uses to pad her way semi-silently through the corridors. She isn't above sneaking her way into the other small rooms (yours, perhaps?) and rifling through their lockers and beneath their beds. Her own particular brand of looting.

Later, she can be found perched primly on the bed of a military truck. Heeled shoes rather abandoned, she bent to the work tying a pair of more substantial combat boots. A bowie knife sits on the truck-bed beside her, alongside a tightly-tied satchel. Whoever she is, she looks as though she's gearing up for a field trip.

[naturallywavy]

Oi.

_{[ A voice calls out as a silver haired guy stands in the doorway, observing as this girl goes about her business rummaging through his room. Rude? ]}

It's not nice to take people's things without permission.
_{[ Looks like he exited his room for a moment, but now he is back and he didn't expect to see somebody else in there. ]}

[mucked]

[ carter stiffens. starched old-world behaviour sinking slowly back into place, where upon his immediate arrival she'd been searching the locker with a kind of...manic curiousity. but now (discovered!) she steps back and -- in what might be a gesture of good will -- holds two empty hands up for viewing. ]

Are they? [ she asks, her voice firm but without aggression. ] Yours? Because I when I woke up in a room precisely like this one, none of the things inside of it were actually mine.

[ blue hair, she notes. odd. very odd. ]

[naturallywavy]

_{[ yeah that's right— show him your hands, thief. He knows of a little girl who has a habit of taking things so good thing you're coming clean. If Carter wants to take the time to really analyze his appearance, he doesn't look like he's from this time period. In fact, that was a yukata on his person, and he only wore it halfway over his black shirt like a complete tool. A sash around his waist held what seemed to be a weapon— like a sword— but it was made out of wood. ]}

There is an item of mine that is here.
_{[ He gestures to the largest item that seems to take up the most room.
It's a scooter. ]}

I can't have anything happen to that. It's what impresses the ladies, you know.

[mucked]

-- Impressive, indeed.

[ although it's difficult to tell what impresses her most: the scooter itself, or the mere fact that he's a creature fortunate enough to have something of his own here with him. peggy hasn't been so fortunate, aside from the clothes on her back. and the heels she's left lying innocuously on his bed while she'd been searching.

her hands drop. she approaches the door -- ostensibly, perhaps, to leave. to spare her dignity its final shred. ]

[withoutaworld]

Rikki's been prowling the grounds of the compound, trying to find some sign of who left this place behind and why, but so far all she's managed to find are people just as confused as she is. And also a sling from the medical bay, which she's secured around her chest to hold the puppy that was in her room when she woke up. She's not about to abandon it, but she definitely wants both her hands free if she runs into trouble.

The woman sitting on the truck... isn't exactly what she'd call trouble, but it's enough to make her stop in her tracks, looking a little dumbstruck. She knows that woman's face, and it's like a punch in the gut. She was much older when Rikki knew her, but she's seen enough pictures, in black and white, that there's no doubt who she's looking at. First a much younger Steve who didn't know her, and now... this.

"I really am dreaming," she mutters to herself.

[mucked]

The last lace is abandoned. Peggy scoots herself to the truck-bed's edge and folds her legs over the lowered tailgate. Her fingers don't touch the bowie knife, but they're near enough. When she sees the young woman, her instinct is to relax. And yet -- she's danced with Dottie recently enough to remind herself it's no use underestimating anyone. So her muscles stay primed.

"Are you?" Primed, but performing too. She smiled a guileless smile and spoke in a voice that was leagues more confident than she felt. "I've told myself the same thing at least half-a-dozen times since arriving. Damned odd dream, though."

[withoutaworld]

Rikki recognizes the tension in her body, the barely-visible threat in her movements, and it stops her from moving any closer right away. She smiles back at Peggy, considerably less sure of herself, and shrugs with one shoulder.

"I don't know, it's not that weird for me. End of the world, familiar faces... Usually there'd be more Nazis to punch, though. And the technicolor animal's new."

She gestures to the bright purple puppy sleeping in the sling on her chest, and then clears her throat a little awkwardly.

"...I'm Rikki. By the way."

[mucked]

If she leans forward now, then it's so she might afford herself the sliver of a better view -- technicolour, indeed. Peggy's brows raise with considerable disbelief, despite what her eyes assure her. If the other strangers are difficult to trust, then the bounties of the building were doubly so difficult.

"Rikki," she tastes the name. Tests it out. And doesn't yet deign to give her own. "That's a very pretty name."

hi did you say something about cr

[conversed]

She looks like she's going somewhere. Clint, meanwhile, looks like he just woke up and found a bow and some arrows, which about sums it up. He has a quiver on one hip and the bow held in one hand, lowered and apparently harmless, and he's wandering past the truck when he hears something and comes to a stop.

Sturdy boots, knife, satchel. He doesn't recognize her, but that isn't surprising. He hasn't recognized anyone yet.

"Did you find the keys?"

[mucked]

Trust is an issue. Apart from one face in particular, she hasn't drummed up enough trust to go 'round this menagerie of mysterious strangers. So when the man with the bow and arrows strolls on by, Peggy allows instinct to put a little wire and steel into her frame. She goes tense. But not too tense. After all, she's more spy than warrior. Brawling's not her first desire.

"They weren't so difficult to find," she raises her chin. Indeed, she knows where most of the keys are for most of the wheel-sets in this makeshift motor pool.

[conversed]

There's something familiar in her posture, even if there isn't anything familiar about her face. Or maybe he's just been hanging out with too many women who are ready to punch him. Maybe that's just paranoia talking. But Clint still seems to be the opposite of tense, unkempt and unguarded.

He hadn't even looked for the keys. He hasn't looked for a heck of a lot since he woke up and found some mysterious paperwork under his mattress. The bow and arrow had been all chance.

Which is dumb, in retrospect. He should probably start looking harder.

"What about in your room? Anything useful?"

[mucked]

She swings her legs over the edge of the lowered tailgate. And then, head canted to the side, she makes a small performance out of trying to recall the unforgettable array of items she'd found in 'her' room, as much as it can ever be called so.

"A bit of unidentifiable horn, a sachet of the most appalling powder I've ever tasted," Peggy takes a moment to better observe the stranger. He looks...not so well put together, she thinks. Except the bow keeps her piqued. Surely, no one merely chooses a bow. Except gunshots attract them. Whoever they are.

"And an umbrella. Tell me, have you peeked outside yet? Does it look likely to rain?"

Her words are bone-dry.

[soapboxed]

With a certain sort of contentment with the decision that the world indeed has come to some sort of fucked up end, it only makes sense to go out into that mess and see what life is really about. He's not the type to stay cooped up somewhere, even if it promises safety. A prison is still a prison, the walls are proof of that.

Of course, he's not a god damn idiot. And he'd rather not turn into zombie food the first minute he steps outside, so his thought was to find the vehicles first.

Seems he's not alone in the idea.

"Well, hey." He answers casually on spotting her, moving over to lean against the bed of the truck on one arm, watching her strap up. "Planning on a sight seeing trip?"

[mucked]

"Something of the sort."

Peggy's words are dry. Dry dry dry. But all her flippancy lives in her voice, because there's nothing casual about the way she raises her chin and watches the stranger as he approaches. Her posture straightens and she remains aware of what's around her: where the bowie knife sits; the length of the truck's bed, the height of the man. No personal affront to him, you see -- merely formalities. By far and large, she hasn't met a person within the compound who hasn't turned out to be at least passably alright. But that doesn't mean her guard's down.

"Though the dearth of tourism brochures has rather left me wanting."

[soapboxed]

"That so?" His arms cross in his red jacket, his lips curve up in a resemblance of a smile, and his eyes fall to her supplies. A knife. To a sane man it'd be a concern. To him it's just another ache, another burst of adrenaline, another fucking fight to feel alive. But she's not reaching for it, so instead it's nothing. Not a damn thing.

"I find most brochures are heavily consumer driven anyway and lack any real useful information. 'Go to this fucking hole in the ground, created free by Mother Nature, which we're now charging you fifty dollars to stare at and spit a loogie off of.'"

[borntochoose]

Kal has never been all that intense about private property, really. He's spent decades traveling around the world, finding job anywhere he could and without knowing how he would feed himself the next day, so the only thing he has ever kept to himself is the black command key tied up around his neck- and now, the Kryptonian skinsuit that he's now wearing.

But while he doesn't care much about his bed (or at all, really, she can keep if it she wants-) he did hide the files he'd found upon waking as best as he could under the mattress. He doesn't know what they are, exactly, but he gets the feeling they are goign to be important. And she looked like she had been going to check just there when he'd entered the room.

"What...?" But no. They are all here without knowing how, they are all on edge. And looking like it bothers him that he had been checking the room might just make her suspicious. "Hi? Can I help you?"

[mucked]

Perhaps she should feel a little more guilt for what she's done and what she's been doing: making her own private canvas of the compound. But it's an old habit from a worse time -- where intelligence is found in the most intimate of places, and she'd been involved in too many undercover missions during the war not to take any opportunity to discover what's here to be discovered. Peggy has no plans to take anything. She merely wants to look; read; see; find. An ignoble pursuit, but one she feels necessary in the absolute pit of her heart.

At the sound of a voice behind her, she bites down on a curse. She straightens, making a point of smoothing her palms over the bed's meagre sheeting. The spy-gone-kidnapped turns on a kitten heel and immediately begins to observe. He's tall. Possesses musculature that speaks of strength and experience. Except she'd expect a strong and experienced man to look more hardened than this: haggard or scarred, like Dum Dum or the other Commandos. But there's a never-dented look to this stranger that catches her eye almost immediately.

"Oh, bloody hell," she huffs. All awkward half-smiles and a flutter of the eyes. "Isn't this where I was dumped upon my arrival?" A waggle of her fingertips. Lying comes easily to her, but half the time it's effectiveness relies upon the base assumptions of the other person. Such lies are easiest told to the narrow-minded and the intolerant. Like proud men, likely to see weakness and folly in a woman. What a fatal error to make that assumption in this moment.

"Silly me," she canted her head. "Always getting lost."

[borntochoose]

Unlike Peggy, Clark doesn't have the same quick ability to read people. Mostly because he's never had to- he's always kept people at length, except his mother. And Lois recently, he guesses, but she was an special case. So all he sees is a woman with an English accent... a woman that had looked far too determined a second ago for him to fully buy that act. Was she just gathering information about the place? Trying to find some more clues? If everyone has gotten something like Clark's files or his scarf it'd make sense that smart people would start looking around for more.

He'd just focused on getting out, but now he realizes maybe he should have paid more attention to what he'd found around himself when he'd woken up.


"It's where I was dumped upon my arrival, so I'd say no." He smiles, amused. He offers her his hand- no need to be rude just because he has a hunch she isn't being completely honest. "I'm Superman. Were you looking for something specific? Maybe I can help."

[rexponsible]

Claire, on the other hand, still hadn't abandoned her own stilettos. She'd run through the jungles of Costa Rica in them, and if she didn't have a choice, she was going to run away from zombies in them too. She didn't know that zombies were out there yet, but something was - the skeleton of a ghost town, for one.

She'd taken to exploring the compound, heels clicking on the floor with no attempts at silence, before she finally wandered to the vehicle bay. She was surprised to see the other woman there, looking the very image of a prim and proper lady and career woman - save for the combat boots she was now lacing on.

Claire wasn't sure she could wear combat boots. What if they actually gave her less dexterity? Regardless -

"Excuse me," Claire said warily. She still didn't know what was going on, so she wasn't going to assume that everyone she met wasn't a threat. "Where are we?"

[mucked]

"Each time I'm asked that question I find myself all the more desperate for some better answer. America, at least. Anything more specific beyond that? You guess is as good as mine."

Any sting that might have been housed in the words is nullified by a mild smile. Nothing near a grin -- and, indeed, it barely looks happy. But it's a polite sort of smile that suggests she's a polite sort of woman, and that she doesn't begrudge the other her conversation. Indeed (once her boot is tied), Peggy hops down from the truck's lowered tailgate and offers a stiff hand.

[rexponsible]

Claire was accustomed to British accents and accents of all sorts, considering the multinational staff and visitors that Jurassic World saw everyday. She took note of it, giving the other woman a tight-lipped smile of her own. She may not have looked as stern or foreboding as Peggy, especially in her tattered clothes, but Claire did have that polished, professional air of a woman who had a position of authority.

She reached out and shook Peggy's hand. Her answer wasn't something that Claire had wanted to hear, but an answer was still an answer, and something could be deduced from it.

"North or South America? I was in Costa Rica before I woke up here," Claire remarked, looking around the vehicle bay with the obvious idea to drive around and see her surroundings.

[narcissistictendencies]

Tony had been quiet in his 'escape' of the small room. He'd found a few things and he'd made his way around. He only lightly explored, to ensure he could find his way back. A quick jaunt to the munitions shed was entirely unhelpful, but he didn't step out empty handed after seeing that sign. He wasn't the gun guy that was Rhodey. Fortunately, he had... five minutes of training. He just used to build them, he wasn't too keen on using them. They had a tendency to cause some silly notion of return fire and unlike some of his friends, he wasn't bulletproof without the aid of his suit.

Rounding upon the vehicles, he visually inspected a few until he heard mild rustling. Quietly, he crept up to the military truck and... didn't find what he expected to find. She looked vaguely like she'd stepped out of an old 50s film. Actress? Then again, she did move like she knew what she was doing, so he lightly rapped a knuckle against the side of the vehicle to get her attention hopefully without entirely startling her, clearing his throat in the process.

"Alright, Bourbon Street Beat, you probably shouldn't be bent over the bed of a truck in a skirt like that. Just an innocent observation." One that he was making just out of striking range, mind you. His idea of a conversation starter was something to be desired, but he had a tendency to say the first thing that came to mind.

[mucked]

Ugh. Already, her proverbial back was up. In a heartbeat, Peggy went from one pragmatic task to sitting stiffly with her legs dangling over the truck bed's edge. Her legs crossed at the ankles: old-world grace in combat boots.

"Perhaps you ought not to have been looking in the first place--" she countered. Sharp British syllables rat-a-tatting like a Gatling gun. Under usual circumstances, Agent Carter might not behave quite so lippy with a stranger in a strange land...but something about the wry tone had left her sense of propriety feeling skinned. Ruffled. And it only got worse when she leaned leftwards and stared hard at the man who'd knocked on the truck.

The resemblance wasn't so obvious that she made any immediate or tangible connection -- but the sight of this man did bring with it a sort of double-take. Her eyes narrowed. She wondered if she'd ever met him once upon a time. Perhaps if the goatee masquerading as a beard had been absent she might have made short work of recognizing the genetics beneath.

[narcissistictendencies]

He couldn't quite get a proper read on her. She screamed old fashioned but at the same time, it seemed entirely authentic. And that sass. It made him smirk with a scoff of amusement. She was a pistol, that was glaringly obvious and completely welcome.

"T'yeah. Probably not." He agreed with a shrug. But it just so happened that thoughts of one Pepper Potts were the deterrent for indulging in the sight, which brought him to the interruption of her search. Stark clipped his All-In sunglasses into the collar of the dark t-shirt he currently wore. The dripping red slash down the front from right shoulder to left hip looked to be made of glossy decal. Over it, he wore a tailored jacket with matching slacks. Somewhat of an odd combination with the graphic tee. Resting his forearm and elbow against the frame of the truck, he leaned in to look inside.

"Looking for something specific or just window shopping?" He slipped his free hand into his pocket and looked back out at the other vehicles. "This isn't exactly my kind of dive, but you seem pretty comfortable--well, as comfortable as anyone can be in that skirt. Government worker?" He inclined his head with a sharp and short upward nod, raising an eyebrow in question.