[IC][Exalted 2.5]Chained in Nightmares

[Kyeudo]

Oilbrook used to be a small village, located on the edge of the filtration complex. Located alongside the narrow oil channel that gave the village its name, the village was built to take advantage of a ready source of food and water and a slightly cooler climate than the rest of the complex. Once it was quaint, with homes neatly organized into the available space. Now the place was crammed to bursting, with shanties and tents jammed anywhere they could fit, even on top of one another. The walls protecting the access ways had been built and rebuilt several times now, ballooning the size of the village to several times its previous size.

Quiet village life had now been replaced with a constant bustle of refugees at work. Temporary shelters needed replaced with more permanent accommodations, walls and fortifications needed expanded, materials needed gathered, food collected and more. Not everyone was constantly at work, however. Dejected clusters of refugees sat here and there in the shadows, drowning their sorrows in alchohol or torpet. The chieftains had banned stills and taken other measures to try and stop the growing number of addicts and wastrels, but not enough warriors could be spared to enforce those laws and so the problem only got worse.

Always now, there is a feeling of desperation in the air, as though something needs done and yet no one knows quite what. Food supplies were stretched thin these days. No one was going hungry yet, but if another tap went bad that could soon change. The oil channel running through town has always been black and murky, but now the villagers avoid it when possible, worried that it too might turn toxic or corrosive. Everyone who knows how to use a weapon carries one, as gremlin attacks become more frequent and more dangerous.

Such are the conditions when you wake up. Another day, looking just a little worse than the day before.

[Belkra]

Alekzandir Smythe woke up much like he did any other day. He had hours before his shift on patrol or guard came up. What he did on any individual day differed depending on which of his men were scheduled and which were not, which were laid up from injuries or sickness, and which were able to get leave. It had been months since Alek asked for any leave. The last leave he went on because he was morning his brother. The brother he was unable to bring home after he was killed on a routine patrol. The leave was forced upon him even after he had been laid up for injuries himself.

He idly swallowed down a modest breakfast because he knew he wouldn't hear the end of it if he skipped meals again. His "morning" time was spent inspecting his equipment, exercising, training, and running over the most likely routes he would be patrolling. These routes changed depending on the needs of the guards. It kept becoming harder to patrol the outer reaches of Oilbrook as it kept growing, but the enlistment of the guards never kept pace.

After his preparations were in order he headed to the outpost early so he could catch up with the happenings of the previous patrols and perhaps lend his insight the best way to handle the next shifts tasks and assignments.

[Kyeudo]

You've barely left your quarters when a messenger boy finds you. "Sir, Captain Dixon wants you at the hubward gate right away. One of the pearl diving teams has gone missing."

The hubward gate, the one blocking the main route out into the oil pools, is a mass of sheet metal and metal girders arc-welded together over a large access way, originally large enough to permit a glasscrawler. Ashwalkers had bored tunnels above the gate, creating arrow slits and murder holes from which the guards could rain projectiles upon any gremlin foolish enough to try to tear through the reinforced hatch covers bolted atop the gate itself. Not the prettiest piece of work, but it held.

You find Captain Dixon in a large room behind the gate, used alternatively as a staging area for expeditions out into the complex and as a training room. Right now a squad of warriors, some of the best from your shift, are packing gear, sharpening weapons, and donning armor. As soon as he sees you, Dixon cuts off talking to one of the squad leaders and comes right over.

"Danvyrs lead a pearl-diving expedition out to a newly discovered untainted pocket, but they haven't returned. They were supposed to be back six hours ago. Hopefully it's nothing, but we can't afford to keep losing people. I need you to take a squad out and bring them home."

[Belkra]

"An untainted pocket?" Alek sounded skeptical. "It sounds too good to be true. No matter. I will find the expedition or die in the attempt."

The Ironsoul looks over the men engaged in preparation, "This is the squad I am to command? Will I be the only Dominus? Also, I'm sure you are able to give me intel for getting to and from the location the expedition set out for." The last was a statement as Alek had come expecting Dixon to take care of everything save that which he purposely left for his subordinates to do.

[Kyeudo]

"Yes, this is your squad. Yes, you're the only Dominus we can spare at the moment. And yes, we've got a map to where the pocket was supposed to be located." He pulls a small leather scroll from a pocket and hands it to you. It contains a rough sketch of the route, marking important landmarks along the way. "Don't get yourself killed out there. We have enough dead heroes."

[Belkra]

"Thank you, Sir. I have no intention of dying needlessly." The Dominus heads over to the group of warriors, looking over them with an appraising eye. "Alright you lot. I'm your commander for this little excursion. We will leave within the hour, so get your kit sorted. Any one of you gets out of line while were out of here gets an attitude adjustment from my hammer," he brandishes his sledge. "Oh, and none of you has permission to die without my express written consent...and I suddenly forgot how to write. Form up when you're ready."

With that he heads over to the gate and waits on his squad, idly checking his gear for the umpteenth time. It was more than a habit. It was a reflex, almost as natural as breathing.

[Kyeudo]

The squad - five men and three women - follows you as you lead them out into the complex. Here at the edges of the growing blight, things are relatively safe. Rust and tarnish only cankers the walls and floor like a fungus instead of collapsing them completely and the oil is black mostly because of grit instead of blood and bile. It still reeks of rot, but other noxious chemicals seem to be absent. Greasy slime clings to ladder rungs and corners, but it doesn't try to crawl towards you when you aren't looking.

Several hours in, though, you begin to need to step carefully. Banks are undercut by acid and corrosion and crumble if too much weight is put upon them. Jagged shards of razor-sharp, ivory crystal jut from random surfaces like broken bones, while tubes and hoses hang from missing panels like entrails. The oil boils spontaneously or hisses where it meets with copper channel linings, sending up a poisonous green mist that thankfully doesn't rise above knee-level. The air is stale and rank with both chemical odors and the smell of purifying meat.

Most of the hazards, though, you can avoid by moving cautiously and you don't spot any gremlins or biomechanoids. You finally reach the first and hopefully only major hazard of the trip, a partially collapsed oil spillway twenty yards across. It used to control the flow of oil down to a lower level, but the top of the retaining wall is falling apart, sending rivulets of redish-black ooze plunging twenty feet into a pool of slime. Only a ragged few chunks of walkway, like a jaw with missing teeth, crop out above the torrent. The fall isn't particularly nasty, but the oil here is. The mess is caustic to flesh, stripping meat from bone in minutes. The trouble is that this is the easiest way across for miles.

[Belkra]

"Alright, this doesn't appear safe, but it is the only way across. We also don't have time to be looking for another way around." Alek eyes the walkway dubiously as he considers how to proceed. It would not do to lose some of the squad to this environmental danger. "We take this one at a time. I want guards on this end. Keep an eye out for anything that might try to give us any grief as we cross. We will setup guards on the other end when we get there."

Alright, I will be rolling Perception + Awareness to try and gauge the best way to cross. That's six dice for two successes.

[Kyeudo]

You know from past trips out into this once-familiar territory that attempts at bridging the oil flows hasn't fared well in recent years. Gremlins have been all too eager to pull them down. Domini have fewer problems getting across, employing a variety of tactics from walking on the ceilings using Magnetic Step to wading across using a magical immunity to acid. Those not so gifted have found that leaping the distance between the walkway chunks to not be too hard, though there have been accidents.

[Belkra]

"I'll lead the way. Let's not drag our feet, but let's not rush either." Alek strides forward confidently. He places his feet in the safest spots he can find and leaps as necessary. Keeping his eye out for gremlins or other things that might try to crash the party is in the back of his mind. "Keep an eye out and warn me if something tries to eat me."

I am able to jump (Strength (4) + Athletics (3) - Mobility (1)) six yards vertically and twelve horizontally. A Conviction channel would allow me to jump nine vertically or eighteen horizontally. If it matters I rolled two successes on a Strength + Athletics. Let me know if the Conviction channel will be needed and I am assuming it would only apply to one leap.

[Kyeudo]

It's less about how far you can jump and more about where you land. I'd like a (Dexterity + Athletics) roll from you.

[Belkra]

Alright, then. It would have to be Dex. Why did it have to be Dex? LOL Five successes on the Dexterity + Athletics roll.

[Kyeudo]

Sorry for the long delay - I was distracted from debating the merits of various possibilities with this scene by the Destiny Beta.

You clear the gaps with relative ease and make it safely across, but not before one of the jutting segments of walkway collapses beneath your weight and slides into the muck, doubling the distance between safe points.

[Belkra]

"Well, crap!" Alek thought. "I just made it harder for my squad to cross." He quickly scanned the side of the walkway he now found himself on for potential threats. Then the Ironsoul looked back to his squad to see if he could better assist them across the walkway made all the more dangerous by his passage. "Be careful where you step. If you fall in because you don't ask for assistance where it is needed, I will personally see to it you clean bathrooms until we all die."

I will be rolling Perception (3) + Awareness (3) for the check to see if anything hostile is creeping up on us. I don't think I get my (While on Watch) bonus for this. This gives me two successes. I'm not sure what I should roll to determine how I can help the others cross, so I will ask for your suggestion. I'm afraid that the walkway will be so deteriorated that every member of the squad will have to cross on their own abilities alone, but I want to make sure no assistance can be offered before I just sit back and let them have a chance of floundering.

Also, Destiny is a neat little game. I got to play it this weekend and I have to say I might actually consider purchasing it.

[Kyeudo]

You don't see any threats.

As for how to get the squad across, I'm interested in what you might come up with. You can, of course, assume you have basic supplies in your pack and you can certainly try to scavenge for materials of some kind in the surrounding area.