Friendly Reminder

[seafronted]

[Somewhere, it is said that the greatest fear is the capability of creation within oneself. The monsters the mind creates. Torment is their forte and they show no pity for those prone to their attacks. They show remorse to no one, only prey on the weak

Comments

Day 1

[notglitching]

[Rinzler's moving slowly. Since emerging from the Unnatural, his processing has cleared, function slowly returning. But he's still injured, damaged-and it's adding up. Data shifts in the gap stabbed through his side, threatening cascade failures, full derezz. And even if the haze of that place is gone, the program's still tied up with loops of conflict, jarring mismatch and the unending close crackling shock of reprimand.

He failed.

The program pauses near a large structure. It's surrounded by green growths-actively viral with this system reconfiguration. The whole city's turned to threat, whispers and shadows looming at every turn, strange shapes and masking images adding to the haze of his malfunctions. It's almost enough to make him wish this hadn't happened. Almost.

His grip clenches on his disks, still held in hand, and Rinzler glances up, forces sensors to alertness. There's a form near the structure's entrance-crouched? Sitting? He eyes it warily behind the black mask, but compared to everything else, it seems less of a

[arethebettermen]

[ Still ever trying to keep track of the mutant students of his, Charles also found that their furry resident had somehow gotten outside. Despite the better judgement, and hopes that his younger adopted sister wouldn't see him outside, Charles shoved the door open of the mansion and wheeled outside to grab the Eevee - who Raven called Erik, and Sean called Oreo.

Charles found the creature under one of the more sinister trees and pulled him out from under it. He held the creature close, hand on the wheelchair to move back inside, when an odd sound caught his ears. Charles turned, looking straight at Rinzler. Whatever he was, he was badly injured. ]

Are you alright? If you need a place to stay for a moment, then you need to get inside now. Before they come back.

[ He managed to send the Wraiths away at the moment, but he knew they'd be back. ]

[notglitching]

[The program tilts his head in response to the other's words, but his gaze is fixed beyond the wheeled figure (user?). There are several of the things now, strange amalgamations of appendages and metal, crawling out of the growths. With the other's outward excursion, they've moved to block the path back to the structure. And they're closing.

The program shifts, dim glow of his circuits brightening with faint activity as he jerks his helmeted head towards the user(?) and behind. Is he aware of the threat?

Rinzler's not sure why he cares.]

[arethebettermen]

[ Charles glances over his shoulder. Bloody hell, these things just don't know when to stop. He pulls buttons the Eevee into his jacket (which honestly wasn't the best of ideas) and presses the wheelchair to move away, raising his other hand to the side of his head in hopes of freezing them with his telepathy long enough to make it inside.

He reaches out with his mind and grabs a hold of a few of them, forcing them to still and not move. Except they're strong and it's hard for him to keep his grasp on the few he does have hold of. There are so many. His eyes dart towards the black figure and he motions with his head for the man to get inside the mansion. He'll be fine. ]

[notglitching]

[Rinzler stares, faint unease creeping through his processing. The other's doing something... a few of the creatures are halting, glitching. But not enough, not nearly. And the user(?) isn't standing, isn't moving to run or hide. Can't?

The program's silent-always silent, especially here, at night, with his noise dampened and halted. But the conflicts inside are growing, sharp static of error and failure mixing, sickening edge of nausea and wrong building, breaking.

There's blood on the ground. Water-blood-

Motion. Action. Combat. Fighting will help, has to help, resolve his systems to focus, precision, correctness. Red-orange disks split, flaring bright against the darkness, and the program cuts across the distance with a short run. Threats. Targets.]

[arethebettermen]

[ That isn't what he expected. Charles leans back against his wheelchair, trying to get out of the man's way. The Eevee yelps in fright, but Charles pushes himself out of the wheelchair to dodge the oncoming man. ]

>.< 'scuse me while I wordvomit. Everywhere.

[notglitching]

[Rinzler doesn't take much dodging-for now, all he's looking for is a fight, and this damaged subject doesn't seem like a worthwhile target. The multilimbed things were at least mobile, looked strong enough, with limbs flexing and reaching to rend, break. (They looked somewhat like larger, more fleshy gridbugs, really). Target. Threat. (Distraction.)

The program's injured. Damaged. (Broken.) Nearly to derezz. He's utterly drained of energy, processes sputtering with error, mismatch, and has spent the last few days in the second worst prolonged experience of his existence. He's still so much better than these things.

Orange circuits sharpen in their glow as Rinzler passes the prone figure, weapons scything in across to block a thrashing arm. The creature in front is forceful, but slow to react, and his disks jerk apart with practiced ease to sever the limb as he stabs out, disks digging into-

Error.

...No.

His weapons slice in, tear, cut. But not through code. He hadn't expected code, not wholly-the ISO was the only threat he'd

:D

[arethebettermen]

[ Charles simply sits on the ground, staring up at the strange masked man. His fingers raise to his temple, trying to hold the reanimati in place and use his other arm to pull himself back towards the mansion, the Eevee huddling behind him. He glances at the man again and tries to speak to him. ]

If you stay, you'll die. You need to leave.

>.>

[notglitching]

[No.

The helmet jerks sideways in denial. Refusal. He's not sure what the damaged user's doing, but it's not enough. He can see that. Even if the creatures stay held, even if the user could move faster, the creatures/users?/gridbugs/things are there already. Between them and the structure, twitching limbs and gaping mouths twisting, eager, ready. The program stares at the man. User. He's barely mobile, effort clearly focused toward the threats. Locking them up, corrupting their runtime somehow. And he's telling Rinzler to leave.

'Go.'

It's not supposed to work that way.

Motion, immediacy, presence-the program's focus flashes upward as a shape drops down. The branches above have shifted, dark and tangled, and the creature managed to climb above them both before falling, three mangled arms twisted to grab and rend. The program twitches, instinctive protocol demanding motion, distance-then holds, braces in a crouch. One disk comes up to intercept the fleshy core, another strikes at the metal junction between two of the arms, limbs

mother of god.

[arethebettermen]

[ He winces and for a moment his hold on the creatures threatens to break, but Charles holds it. It's not like holding Shaw in place. It's sheer numbers as opposed to how powerful one person is. His telepathy only does well on wraiths. These are things he can't use his mind to fight and it makes him feel even more useless than he already is. He still tries to push himself back with one arm, the other firmly against his head as he's trying to hold them for the man. Either to fight or for him to run away, either way the man has to make his choice. ]