Active Plots (Alphabetical) - Updated 8/21/2010

Can't I Have Any Time? - (Eruantion Doriath [?], Amonost Doriath [?])

End of Solitude - (Verda Stelo [?])

No More Grape Soda - (Alex Dean [?], Samuel Jorgenson [?], Leon Mecheeto [?])

Questionable Means - (Tawny Black [?], Ishkan Ma'z)

Author	Comment
Balinor Pill Popping Medic 3/16/2008 1:21:10 AM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 48	Tenga Cuidado con Piedras A CA2 Wisp with the name ‘Dolly2’ painted in big, blue letters on its hull docks in the landing port in Kote Intergalactic Spaceport.  50 plus passengers flood out, most in various degrees of vacation preparation.  The spaceport erupts into noise as people find their luggage and relatives, and, just as quickly, the uproar thins and the spaceport is almost completely devoid of tourists.  A few stragglers still hang about, just now sorting their own affairs, having waited for the mob to disperse.  The four member Dolly2 crew is the last to file out the gate. Balinor Black smoothes the lining of her skirt and pulls her suitcase by the plastic handle.  It rolls behind her, clacking against the cracks in the linoleum floor as her heels click in laconic rhythm.  She bypasses security with the wave of a small badge and continues into the great, tropical outdoors.  The atmosphere does not sit well with her; she is forced to roll up her sleeves.  A tall man in a slightly yellowed gray suit is waiting for her with a sign that reads, ‘Balenor Black’.  Behind him is a rich looking Mercedes-Benz.  He’s holding the door open. She slides into the passenger seat wordlessly as he puts her suitcase and the misspelled sign into the trunk.  He then situates himself in the driver’s seat and programs the car to their destination.  As it pulls away from the spaceport, Balinor clears her throat once. Bali: No ‘e’.  It’s an ‘i’. Man: Excuse me? Bali: You spelled my name wrong. The man chuckles softly under his breath. Man: Pardon us, Miss Black.  We didn’t think of it over the heliocomm.   Balinor greets his excuse with a long, cold stare that reveals nothing of her opinion on the matter.  The man dismisses her expression passively, presses a few buttons on the dash and sighs contentedly as Mozart wafts out of the speakers.  A few minutes go by. Man: Is the car to your liking? Bali: It’s fine. Bali has been looking out the window at the passing scenery, but now she lets her head fall on the headrest and closes her eyes.  The man looks over at her as the car merges itself onto the expressway.  He offers her another small laugh. Man: You are what they said you were. Bali: And what is that? Man: Incomprehensible. Balinor smiles at his comment and her stark features soften immensely.  She settles into the seat a little more comfortably, and the man also smiles, seeing her relax. Man: I take it your flight was long? Bali: Yes. Man: Well, we won’t be where we’re going for another 3 hours, so feel free to take a nap.  This car drives pretty smoothly. Balinor accepts his offer without second thought and drifts off to sleep to the quiet sound of Mozart’s 40th Symphony.
Szyren Phoenix in Training 3/16/2008 1:58:21 AM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 122	RE: Tenga Cuidado con Piedras Exactly two and a half hours later, Balinor opens her eyes to see that the surroundings outside the car have drastically changed.  Where once were tropical trees stretching high into the stratosphere now stand the sad skeletons of rainforests and the bleak, barren scar tissue of Core Mining’s relentless excavation of the earth.  Rock faces stare back at Balinor, and she catches herself sucking in her breath sharply. Her driver is watching her again, she turns to face him, slowly. Man: It’s a lot different out here.  That’s what you’re thinking. Bali: Of course. Man: Is that all you have to say about it? Bali: Yes. Man: Are you sure? Bali: I have nothing else to say. Man: Well, usually people have some kind of opinion about it.  Are you saying you aren’t an environmentalist? Bali: What would make you think I was? Man: Well, you’re a doctor.  You help people.  Usually, people involved in that kind of career care about the environment as well. Bali: I am good at being a doctor. Bali’s tone suggests finality, so the man drops the subject.  For a while, it seems as though he is fighting to come up with something else to say, but if he is, he decides against it in the end. Fifteen minutes later, it’s Bali’s turn to break the silence. Bali: How bad are they? The man’s expression turns grave. Man: They’re not good. Bali: Why wasn’t I flown in? The man doesn’t respond right away, and Bali grows anxious in the ensuing silence.  She does not appreciate the answer hanging in the air. Bali: Why wasn’t I flown in? She asks more forcefully this time.  Finally, the man opens his mouth with a reply. Man: Time is no longer of the essence, and we thought you would welcome the opportunity to rest before you began your work. Bali: Isn’t that my decision? Man: Of course. Bali: Isn’t that why you arranged to have me brought in? Man: Of course, Miss Black.  But the circumstances changed since you departed Meeriad two days ago and when you arrived today. Bali: I am not a coroner. Man: We understand that, Miss Black.  But more of our workers are falling ill every day, and we thought that if you just looked at the bodies-- Bali: I understand you represent your company, but I would like a name to call you by. The man seems taken aback by this interruption, but acquiesces after a moment of thought. Man: My name is William Hugo Grant. Bali: Mr. Grant, I am not a coroner. William: Yes, Miss Black, but as I was saying, more of us are getting sick daily.  Our company would appreciate it greatly if you would try to determine the cause… try to determine why. Bali closes her eyes and presses her fingers to her temples in concentration. Bali: You should have told me this at the space station, Mr. Grant. William: Yes, but then you might not have come. Despite herself, Balinor has to agree. Sometimes you get a better perspective of things when they're up-side-down.
Balinor Pill Popping Medic 3/16/2008 11:41:46 PM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 48	RE: Tenga Cuidado con Piedras The outpost comes into view, like a giant aluminum can against a stark gray backdrop.  The landscape has become remarkably flat and barren, although submerged, with only a few spindly trees reaching up out of an earth that’s trying to strangle them out of existence.  Even the water which covers the land is tinted with a steel hue.  Surprisingly, it is not murky, but clear.  The road is the only thing that looks maintained, nary has a pothole infected the blacktop surface, raised above the level of the water, and the car continues to roll smoothly towards its destination. As they reach the top of a small incline, Balinor is afforded a greater view of the mining colony.  Now she sees it is not just one, but five cylindrical buildings arranged as points in a pentagram; a road and several enclosed conveyor walkways connect them, and each is connected to all of the others.  In the dead center is a dome which houses numerous tanks, no doubt treatment facilities working to sustain a livable environment within the main buildings by recycling water and air. Balinor: This is not a temporary settlement. She states it factually.  William replies with an explanation. William: No… it’s quite permanent.  But Core Mining didn’t build it.  We found it, in the middle of what used to be a rainforest.  Now… it serves as a hub for all the outposts in a 100 mile vicinity… A sort of temporary reprieve for the workers, a break room for extended breaks.  It’s common to work for weeks straight without a day off, but the reward is a week long leave of absence.  Most workers don’t have family to get back to, so they come here. William continues: It’s equipped with a gym, casino, a golf course, a bowling alley… and that’s just one tower.  We also have offices, a church which offers services for almost any denomination, an expansive shopping center, three cafeterias, dormitories— Balinor’s look of total non-interest stops William mid-rave. William: I guess you don’t care about any of that, though.  The hospital is in the easternmost tower, the third one back, from your point of view.  I imagine you’d like to forego the tour and just head straight there, correct? Balinor: Yes. Unblinkingly.
Balinor Pill Popping Medic 3/17/2008 8:34:12 PM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 48	RE: Tenga Cuidado con Piedras What Balinor finds in the mortuary is stomach churning.  Three bodies, laid out on metal tables, are hardly recognizable as human anymore.  Black blisters have perforated every inch of their skin and erupted with oozing green mucus.  The smell is overwhelming despite the surgical mask she wears.  She examines the bodies methodically, and makes notes in verbal shorthand on a voice recorder. Balinor:  --severe scarring on feet and hands. Pustules interior as well, signs of abrasions beneath the skin.  Green puss, sweat-texture, unfamiliar scent, venomous.  Interior eyelids show lesion growth, cornea suffers extreme damage.  Vesicles in mouth, tongue, pallet, throat, nostrils.  Skin lacks elasticity, severe dehydration, dark purple hue.  Lymph nodes are swollen, appear bruised.  Hair is thin, brittle, falling out.  Need to speak with coroner concerning urine and stomach sample. She switches the recorder off and motions for the assistants to return the bodies to their coolers.  William and another doctor, known as Ian McMullen, are waiting for her outside the door, where two more assistants take her scrubs to be incinerated. William: What’s the verdict, doc? Balinor eyes him dangerously. William: Right, don’t call you doc.  Got it. Balinor: They’re dead.  Dr. McMullen, what were their symptoms before death? Ian McMullen is a fidgety, small man, at half a foot shorter than Balinor.  He has a bulbous nose and beady eyes which he hides behind thick, round glasses.  He wrings his hands together and doesn’t look directly at Bali as he answers her question. Ian: Well, uh, they all had fevers, and, umm… they complained of headaches, back-aches, all around malaise.  Muscle stiffness.  Acute prostration… diarrhea and vomiting… He adjusts his glasses nervously and Balinor nods for him to continue. Ian: We treated all the symptoms, it just seemed like a bad case of influenza.  But they grew progressively worse.  And then they grew… spots. Balinor: Spots? Ian: Yes.  Like chicken pox.  And, well, you saw what happened afterwards. Balinor: How long from onset to death? Ian: The longest was… ah, 27 days. Balinor absorbs the information and takes a minute to consider it.  A nagging suspicion is forming in the back of her mind. Balinor: What of the ones who are still alive? William: Right now they’re quarantined in their hospital rooms, under constant supervision. Balinor: I suggest you move them to another tower and deny access to anyone who isn’t a doctor.  Anyone who develops similar symptoms should be quarantined as well.
Balinor Pill Popping Medic 3/18/2008 1:49:11 AM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 48	RE: Tenga Cuidado con Piedras Three small, white pills, an orange capsule, and two light green tablets.  She downs them all without water, swallows heavily, and for a few seconds, the only thing left to do is breath.  A stabbing pain in her right temple slowly ebbs away and her hands stop shaking. Balinor: Frag. She inhales sharply and holds the air in her lungs for one… two… three… four… seconds and exhales.  She pulls the surgical mask up over her nose and it snaps into place. It’s been three months.  Three months since she first arrived and set eyes on the disease that’s been crawling its way through Core Mining workers.  Most don’t survive; the few who do are left horribly disfigured, scarred, and blind.  Those first three died were lucky.  They didn’t survive long enough for their skin to start falling off in glutinous chunks, for the lining of their stomachs to erode completely away and spill acid into their bloodstreams, for their vital organs to begin eating at themselves as they are slowly turned inside out. No one goes in or out of the facility anymore, it’s under the strictest of governmental quarantines. It took her all of two hours to diagnose her patients with rockpox, and since then, no one has been allowed to leave.  Not even Balinor herself, who had been vaccinated against every known disease under the proverbial sun when she entered military service.  She is immune.  The survivors were now immune.  A handful of others share her history, and are also immune.  Everyone else… She chokes back the thought that had been nested in her mind since day one.  Everyone in the facility was doomed; there is no cure for this disease.  Rockpox spreads through air, through ventilation systems.  Everyone in the facility shares the same recycled air.  Everyone in the facility had been exposed to the virus even before she arrived.  Now, all she can do is clean up the mess, wait till everyone is gone, wait until the quarantine is lifted.  She is a hostage. Every week supplies are sent in via passenger-less shuttle, and, along with them, her array of anti-pyschotic medications.  She hasn’t had a fit yet, but at the rate things are going she expects one soon.  The stress mounts daily as more and more people are moved from their sickbeds to the metal trays in the coroner’s office.  The coroner is among them. William Hugo Grant is one of few lucky enough to have been vaccinated, and over the past three months Balinor has gotten to know him very well.  He was born and raised on Meeriad where he studied to be an exobiologist.  After several years of studying the migration patterns of minerals, William was recruited by Core Mining as their leading scientist on Kote, in charge of predicting where all the best materials for excavation will be.  For the past thirteen years, this has been his life. Until now.  Now, his life, as well as Balinor’s, revolves around watching the people he’s  shared the past 17 years with die in a grotesque and horrible fashion. Despite this, he has been a stabilizing force in Balinor’s slow submission to her own madness.  He was the first person she made contact with on this horrible planet, he is the only person she trusts enough to cry on at the end of another long slew of deaths, the only person she knows won’t be dead by morning, the only person who doesn’t expect her to be strong all the time. Now, she’s standing in the hallway outside his room, downing a handful of pills to alleviate the pounding of her racing heart.  Now, he places a hand on her shoulder and offers her a can of hot chocolate. William: It’s three in the morning.  Don’t you ever sleep? Balinor: They’re screaming again. William: You should move out of the hospital wing, Bali.  You never rest. She takes the hot can and sips at it, tenderly. Balinor: They need me there. William: They want to need you.  You want them to need you.  The truth is, nothing you do can help them.  You know that. Balinor: Yes. She leans back against the wall, wipes her forehead with the palm of her hand and finds it’s sticky.  She’s sweating.  She really does need to rest, and she really cannot do it in her current lodgings, her own, private room in the thick of the medical tower.  Closing her eyes, she takes another drink. Balinor: Can you acquire a spare room key? William: Of course.
Balinor Pill Popping Medic 3/19/2008 12:11:48 AM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 48	RE: Tenga Cuidado con Piedras When William returns from the receptionist area of the dorm with her key, Balinor has already fallen asleep on his couch, her mask still wrapped around her ears.  He removes it gingerly and covers her with a spare blanket, setting the mask and key down on an end table.  As he goes to his own bed he turns the light off behind him, casting a wistful look to the darkness. -- Balinor wakes and stretches and for a moment nothing is wrong.  Then she remembers where she is, and why she’s there, and the world collapses again.  She looks around the room.  It’s not the first time she’s been in William’s dorm, but it’s the first time she’s woken up here.  Everything looks different in the morning.  The clock at the bottom of the TV set reads 8:15 am.  She’s been asleep for five hours.  That’s more sleep than she’s gotten in the past week. She can hear William breathing heavily in the next room.  The key he left for her is still on the table and she takes it.  The mask she shoves in her pocket.  She has no real use for it; she only wears it for the comfort of the patients who seem somehow calmed by it, though she would expect the exact opposite.   She’s halfway out the door when she hears a strange rattling coming from the vent above the couch.  Since she’s arrived the air system has always been a constant hum in her ear, but she’s never heard it create this much noise before.  The possibility that it might just be a loose screw in the ducts above William’s room crosses her mind, but for some reason she quickly dismisses it.  This seems much less random. The clattering stops, and starts again, stops, starts, stops, and is silent.  Second hand air continues to circulate with its usual dull drone.  Balinor is, at this point, too curious to shrug it off and steps back into the room.  Using the back of the couch as a stepladder she’s just tall enough to slide the vent cover half way off and grope around in the dark hole above her head.   Her fingers brush against something smooth and hard.  She has to get up on her tip-toes grab it, but manages to wrap her hand around it and pull it out. What she’s found is a cell phone, half wrapped in a handkerchief.  The backlight is on, the phone is complaining to her about 1 missed call, the phone is set to vibrate.  That explains the rattling in the shaft.  Though why William keeps a cell phone hidden in his air duct is beyond her.  Deciding it’s best just to let the sleeping dog lie, she puts the phone back where she found it, slides the cover shut, and leaves the room.
Balinor Pill Popping Medic 3/21/2008 10:45:45 PM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 48	RE: Tenga Cuidado con Piedras After a flavorless breakfast, it doesn’t take long for Balinor to move her belongings from her room in the hospital to the room William obtained for her.  She doesn’t have that many belongings to move.  She only brought with her one suitcase with a few changes of clothing and a large bag of doctorial accessories.  Since her arrival she’s expanded her wardrobe on account of the shopping center located in the 2nd Tower, but beyond that her assets haven’t expanded and the transition is made smoothly.  Not to mention, made alone.  Since she left his apartment, William has been incommunicado. Balinor spends the rest of the day tending to the dying.  She fluffs pillows, changes bed-linens, washes blankets, administers hefty doses of painkillers, changes IVs, feeds the patients too malformed to feed themselves, washes them; the only thing she can do at this point is try to make them as comfortable as possible in their deathbeds.  The few survivors receive similar treatments; Balinor also applies medicinal creams to their skin to diminish the appearance of their scars. Of Core Mining’s medical staff, only one aide and three doctors survive to assist her.  Dr. Ian McMullen is not one of them; he fell ill four weeks after Balinor’s arrival and suffered for a month and half.  His was one of the worst, most prolonged cases.  Balinor almost believed, because he fought the disease for so long, that he would survive it.  He did not. She works for nine hours straight, takes a half hour break during which she forces herself to eat canned soup, and works again for another three hours to ensure that those who are still able will sleep as best they can. When Balinor returns to her room, her Core Mining issued holocommunicator is blinking with a new message.  The message is only audio, instructions to contact Core Mining headquarters as soon as possible.  The voice is automated.  They expected to speak to her answering machine. Balinor puts off returning the call.  She bathes.  She folds all of her clothes and places them neatly in her drawers.  She chokes down a dinner of canned pork and beans and refuses to despair the fact that canned food is all she has been allowed to eat for the past two months.  Canned food is all they send anymore, but her youth in the military had accustomed her to a tasteless diet. Finally, when there is nothing further for her to occupy herself with, she makes the call.
Lydyn S.T.A.R. 3/21/2008 11:27:10 PM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 116	RE: Tenga Cuidado con Piedras (Delete this please!)
Szyren Phoenix in Training 3/22/2008 12:37:20 AM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 122	RE: Tenga Cuidado con Piedras A robot answers the phone without any type of humanoid inflection in its voice.  Apparently, Core Mining doesn’t try very hard to appear human. Robot: Thank you for calling Core Mining Station 5, Kote division.  Please state your name and business, then press pound. Balinor: Dr. Balinor Black.  I need to speak— She is cut off abruptly. Woman’s Voice: Thank you for calling, Dr. Black.  Please hold while I transfer your call. The woman doesn’t give Balinor a chance to reply before elevator worthy music floats over the connection.  While holding, Balinor moves from the table where she had been sitting to the couch, where she makes herself comfortable.  An image flickers on the communicator screen before two men in dress suits take shape.  She recognizes one as William’s boss, Edwin Flemming, the other she doesn’t know.  They’re both rather seedy looking men. Edwin: Miss Black, thank you for returning our call so promptly. That’s one thing she’s noticed.  Whenever a Core Mining employee speaks in reference to his company, he speaks of himself in the third person plural.  Balinor can tell by his tone that he doesn’t think her return call came at all promptly. Balinor: I was busy trying to preserve what’s left of your employees. Edwin: Very good, but we have medical staff for that. Balinor: I am medical staff. Edwin: Not anymore, Miss Black.  Your expertise is being wasted caring for the dieing, and since we are paying your salary, we’d prefer that you be useful to us. The man next to him is nodding so much so that his head might just roll off his shoulders any second, though Balinor gets the impression that he is the man in control of the situation and Edwin is just a puppet he’s wearing on his hand. Balinor: Please explain. Edwin: You must know that rockpox is all but exterminated in the known galaxy, this outbreak is inexplicable.  We would like you to discover how it got into our system. Balinor: First I am made to play coroner when I expected to play diagnostician, then I am held hostage because your own doctors were too stubborn to see those deaths for what they were, and now I am being asked to play detective? Edwin: You will be rewarded for your efforts. Balinor does not look happy, but she does not say anything to suggest her sour mood over the holocomm.  She has not forgotten that they can see her, however, and hopes her opinion of the matter is clear.  The other man clears his throat. Man: Miss Black, we will triple what we originally offered you if you do this for us.  We are working with the Kote government in order to resolve this issue as quickly and painlessly as possible.  We are very sorry for the suffering this has, no doubt, caused you, but your aid in this matter would be much appreciated.  We have great faith in your ability to solve this mystery. Balinor hesitates to accept. Balinor: And what if I am unable to solve this mystery? Man: The quarantine will not be lifted until you do. Balinor: You leave me no choice, then. The man smiles and the cruelty contained within it is truly disturbing. Man: We are so very glad for your assistance. Edwin: You are being sent a document containing further instructions. Balinor’s holocomm beeps as it receives the sent file. Edwin: We expect a detailed report of your investigation at the end of each day.  You will find the number of where to leave it in that file.  Please take as much time as you need, but we really would like to settle this matter swiftly. Balinor: Of course. Edwin: Enjoy the rest of your evening, Miss Black. Balinor switches the holocomm off and has to restrain herself from smashing it against the wall.  She sets it down on her nightstand, and throws a pillow instead. She is startled when William catches it. Balinor: I didn’t see you there. William: On the holo, just now, that was the most I’ve ever heard you say in one sitting. Balinor glares at him angrily and he holds up his hands in surrender.  He brings the pillow over and sits on the bed beside her. Balinor: Did you hear what they said? Her voice cracks, betraying her rage, and she erupts into tears as much frustrated by her own weakness as by the situation she has been trapped in. (I will post another post after you post your entrance) Sometimes you get a better perspective of things when they're up-side-down.
Lydyn S.T.A.R. 3/22/2008 1:15:05 AM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 116	RE: Tenga Cuidado con Piedras As Balinor manages to finish her call back to Core Mining HQ she begins to here some people running back and forth in the halls and several of the survivors talking about a ship into the air. About five hundred feet away, a ship entering the atmosphere begins to heat up making it look like a bright comet of sorts. It's direction? Heading almost directly towards the mining colony. Meanwhile on the Ship ... Pilot: I can't steer her! We're going to crash! Oh, frag! Commando: What!? Can't you control the dang thing? Make a crash landing? Pilot: She's too out of control! I can't do anything! Chance: Aren't there escape pods or something!? Commando: No! No... there isn't.. we're all going to die! Jake: No we can't die now! As panic begins to spread among the crew, mostly a result of their rushed job in trying to acquire Star, she takes the chance to take her recharging program offline and exits the door of her room. Just as she figured, the robot guarding her room wasn't so good at balancing and with a forceful hit on it's head, she forces it down and puts her knee to it's chest. Without the agility or reflexes of her own systems and A.I., she tears a main circuit from the robot and effectively powers it down. Things were not going so good as the ship began to shake, radio chatter going on about how they were just about to crash, leaving Star no choice but to try and minimize the damage to herself. Whether Peter was with this 'Miles' or not, she didn't have the time to check the bay they had forced her to dock in. Crouching down, she propelled herself up and broke through the hull into the outside air, weakened by the heat of impact. Just in time as well as it crashed into the ground and makes a sizable explosion, flinging Star into the air. As she flew through the air, she tried to minimize impact on the ground herself by shifting her weight from this side to that and effectively landed herself back down into the rather shallow water surrounding the mining colony. The ship was all but completely gone now and once again, she was left with new damage, dents, and cracks in her exterior shell. Though, by fate or a miracle, it wasn't anything impairing her from functioning normally but it was sure on it's way by this point. She gets up slowly and brushes off whatever didn't belong on her skin and scanned the nearby area slowly and by the time she turned half-way around, she had spotted the colony. Seeing as it was about the only thing around, she took herself towards it. Half an hour later ... She walks up to the entrance and the doors open without any problem, mostly because the systems haven't detected her as a human. The nice, pleasant voice rings over the main lobby with an "welcome," as some of the people look at her in shock and wonder (those very, very few around anyways). Without hesitation, she begins walking towards an un-maned computer within the lobby and pushes the chair aside, just about to try and hack into the network ...

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