etrayalogs | MISSION 002

WHO: Everyone!
WHEN: May 3rd-28th
WHERE: Within the Labyrinth
WHAT: The second Mission
NOTES\WARNINGS: Potential death, violence, injury. Please add additional warnings as needed within threads.

⏵ into the labyrinth ⏴

Aurora's announced time for the mission was correct: four days after, as she had promised, the door to the Labyrinth opens, connected to Etraya's atmospheric bubble by its entrance point. Characters are directed to come to the entrance on May 3rd, and warned that they may want to bring medical supplies, weaponry, and any important artifacts along with them. She warns that large vehicles will not fit within the limited space available, and smaller ones may be difficult to remove, thus advises those to stay behind. Aurora also offers to watch over any companion animals and keep them safe while competitors complete the Labyrinth.

They are given a short amount of time outside of the entrance to speak with one another, to plan and organize themselves, before they are ushered into it in groups of two to four. Once passed the entrance, they'll find that they are unable to turn around and exit out of it: a barrier keeps them from going back into the city proper, and as soon as they are far enough forward, the walls around them shift, closing them in, moving in complex patterns meant to separate them and bring them together.

Characters with extraordinary abilities may find some of them inaccessible: super strength may be downgraded to closer to ordinary strength, magic may prove to be less predictable than it should be, and regardless of how strong, fast, or clever characters are: passing over the Labyrinth walls or destroying them proves to be impossible. While one may be able to run through the pathways at superhuman speeds, the pathways compensate for it by running them in circles, refusing to allow them to make any progress on their own.

⏵ pathways collide ⏴

Junctures of the Labyrinth often present competitors with choices, some that may have consequences: a left turn down a darker path may prove to be harmless, whereas the well-lit path may be full of traps intent on slowing them down: a trip wire that activates a swinging massive axe, or arrows that shoot straight out of the wall as soon as one gets close enough.

Other junctures may present characters with choices that have consequences: they can choose the shortest pathway, but at great personal risk to themselves or their partner (ie, you can go this way, but your arm isn’t going with you) or they can choose the lengthy pathway full of traps and trials they’ll have to surpass to get to the end.

⏵ balancing act ⏴

The pathway opens up into a massive space, but it's not one with an easy path out: instead, competitors will find an obstacle course that will not let them continue forward until they complete it. Many of the tasks involve things that one cannot do on their own: they must walk across multiple wooden boards balanced precariously on a tall beam, but to ensure it's balanced, there must be one person on both sides of the boards and make sure that they're walking on the board in just the right space to ensure their weight doesn't cause it to sink too far on the opposite side. If a smaller child is on one end, they may want to stand significantly further away from the beam than the larger person on the other half.

⏵ help! i'm bleeding! ⏴

A large garden area spawns off of a pathway. The peaceful chirping of birds can be heard among blooming cherry blossom trees, and it all seems utterly peaceful and calm. An area one might wish to take a breather in, enjoy the sunshine reflecting from above, and get a good nap in. Or would, except a companion bot whose abdomen is covered in ketchup appears to be struggling across the ground, crying out for help. They state they are bleeding profusely and require immediate medical attention, otherwise, they will die.

The companion bot also carries a bag of medical supplies and MREs, which player characters are welcome to utilize. The pathway out of this open space will not open until after the companion bot no longer states they are dying. Whether it's because they're "dead", or because those who came across them offered "medical attention" and patched them up until they've stated they're good and no longer need assistance - well, both will technically suffice.

⏵ choice is an illusion ⏴

After walking down an additional pathway, characters will find themselves trapped within a glass box. In front of them is a pedestal with two buttons: one red, and one green, as well as a tablet above it displaying the image of another group of characters. The tablet states hindering them will help you. You may either choose to make the second group's time through the maze more difficult, or hinder your progress by pressing the green button and helping the other group forward.

Characters are given two minutes to decide which path to take; the timer, on the tablet, counts down regardless of any attempt to break or hack it.

Pressing the green button will drop several squishmallows into the glass box. Inside one of them is a key that unlocks the roof of the glass box. Pressing the red button, while it promises to hinder the other group, actually. . . causes a toxic yellow gas to flood the glass box. The gas will burn the lungs of those who breathe it in, but it also begins slowly melting the glass box. This gas will make breathing difficult for the next 24 hours, but will not kill those who inhale it. Healing factors will not offset the gas.

⏵ who deserves the knife? ⏴

A group of two characters will walk through one corridor and find themselves strapped to two chairs, the backs of which are leaning against each other. In front of the both of them are drills, slowly approaching their chests. They cannot go sideways but can push forward and backward. They can push backward and get themselves further away from the threat of injury - forcing the person behind them to suffer but allowing themselves to escape - or they can push into the drill and free the person they're with. Alternatively, they can choose not to push either way, potentially sacrificing them both.

Three options, but they are left with minimal time to decide as the drill continues to press closer. If they choose to go out together, they'll find that as the drills press against their chest - they simply stop. Minimal blood will be spilled, and they will have all the time they need to figure out how to squirm out of their bindings.

⏵ the Siren waits for thee ⏴
A seemingly harmless pathway turns into much more trouble than it's worth. A few steps through a corridor, and suddenly competitors will find the floor falling out from under them, revealing a body of water and - no solid ground on either side of it. There are the walls, but they lack any good climbing holds. Within the water are numerous Sirens - beautiful androgynous creatures that sing soft songs meant to entice others into following them deep into the water. While they may look beautiful, their mouths are full of razor-sharp teeth, and their intentions certainly aren't innocent. However, the Sirens can only touch competitors once they have initiated touch first. They will do their best to encourage this: holding out their hands, crying out for help, pretending to drown, or trying to coax them into coming in close enough for a kiss. As long as they remain on the path, they're harmless. But the moment they reach out for the Sirens... getting away from them will not be easy. Their tails are powerful, built for moving swiftly throughout the water and dragging others along with them. They bite hard and will dig their teeth deep into flesh to discourage struggling.

If one gets captured by them? They're lunch. Or worse yet: if they get bitten but manage to escape, they may find themselves becoming a bit.. scaley around the neck, eyes shifting color to a too-soft green, and an almost impossible-to-resist urge to take a bite out of their friends.

This effect will continue until May 28th regardless of when the character reaches the end of the Labyrinth. After May 28th, they will find that their scales slowly begin to shed, their eyes begin to turn back to their normal shade, and any other new features slowly turn back to how they were before they were infected.

⏵ don't forget your ball of twine ⏴

The Labyrinth is large, and there are many challenges around each corner. There may be space for breaks in between monsters, challenges, riddles, places to sit and recuperate between battles and mind games. It's not all chaos and challenges meant to test one's strength of will.

⏵ NOTES ⏴
May's mission is completing a massive Labyrinth. All characters must enter the Labyrinth; whether or not they participate once they're inside is up to them, but no one will be permitted to stay behind in the city.

The duo who completes the Labyrinth first will be allowed to assist in choosing the next mission. Sign-ups for this are here. We will contact the chosen characters on May 13th.

This mission will cover the time between May 3rd and May 28th. After May 28th, any characters who have not yet exited the Labyrinth will be gathered by the companion bots and brought back into the city. The companion bots will be aiming for nonviolent intervention. If more is needed, please let us know here.

The first to exit will be returning to the city on May 15th.

There will be powercapping during this mission, but the extent of which is fully up to players. We want the Labyrinth to be challenging but don't want to hinder gameplay too much. If you have any questions relating to this or want assistance coming up with ways to powercap your character, please feel free to ask us here. We will be largely leaving this up to player discretion.

Food is scarce within the Labyrinth, but not impossible to find. There are chests (or maybe they're mimics?) strewn throughout with various useful items. One might have a sword, another might have a fresh chicken nugget Happy Meal from McDonalds. Or an entire birthday cake, candles included.

Large vehicles will not fit in the Labyrinth and must be left behind in the city.

Numerous challenges are throughout the Labyrinth. You are welcome to make your own, but we will also provide several you may utilize! Please feel free to throw down wildcards, or your own challenges into your prompts! The limitation is that characters must remain themselves throughout the challenges. There are no mirror replicas, nothing within the Labyrinth will affect their personalities or core values. It’s meant to challenge, not change them.

Deaths that occur within the Labyrinth will last 24 hours. Please report these on our Death Tracker.

All new locations will appear after player characters have returned to the city. Feel free to note the differences from the May 3rd map, versus what characters will be returning to on May 15th.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Nothing explodes, although it's pretty close to his temper exploding when the engine roars to life. His eyes fly open and Robin scrambles to his feet, already reaching for the righthand grip of the handlebars to block the accelerator. ]

What are you doing?! That's my ride!

[ If she so much as moves towards to take off, he'll have to shove her off or jump on. But she's started the bike, so he'll give her a chance to have some common sense. ]

( a shape leaps to life out of the grass, and clarke's head snaps in that direction as she grips the throttle tubes with clammy, blistering hands. her heartrate rockets, half expecting a monster to converge but — the thing is boy shaped, and shouts at her with a particularly human sort of indignance. so for a long moment, she just freezes.

still hunched towards the front fairing, still absolutely braced to take off at any moment. even when faced with the bikes owner, she doesn't recognize him and still considers smashing her heel into the kickstand and seeing just how far she'd get. but when approaching the scene it'd been with a sense of convenient appropriation, not outright theft. her lips curl against her teeth in visual displeasure, but...

slowly, clarke peels stiff fingers off the grips and slowly raises both hands in the universal signal of surrender. )

Sorry. ( does she sound particularly sorry? no, more a little put out. ) I didn't see you there.

[ Clarke can be as annoyed as she wants; he's used to annoying would-be thieves. Not that he would call her that aloud. He's seen enough of the maze to know it isn't only walls and dead ends. She probably thought it was another part of the maze and that she was the lucky one who found the motorcycle. ]

And you thought it was fair game because you didn't see me and Batgirl enter the maze with it. So you were going to hop onto a vehicle that miraculously turned up in a maze.

[ Yeah, he's taking the key out of the ignition before she hurts herself. Tim hasn't found any boons in the maze, and, if he didn't, he wouldn't simply leap onto one the second he saw it. She's lucky all right - lucky it was his. ]

You know you're in a labyrinth, right? Famously known as hospitable locations that provide the means of escape?

[ ... he's still going to treat her like a thief, which means all of this is served up with chipper sarcasm. ]

( he kills the bike, and clarke drops her hands down to her thighs as the rumble of the engine cuts off. everything about the red spandex clad figure's tone grates, and she rankles appropriately. tries to keep it under wraps, but it's been more than a few days out here already and exhaustion really does a number on one's personal mask. a particularly sour glare is shot tim's way, grey-bloodshot eyes boring a hole in the white lenses of his domino mask — but then she's at least moving to dismount the bike.

even if either would have earned an automatic death sentence on board the ark, there is a big difference between outright theft and attempted misappropriation of someone else's abandoned property. (clarke baby, please, he was like 10 feet away.) )

You can save the condescension. This is hardly my first labyrinth, and this one has proved to be relatively straight forward. You get a lot further by engaging with whatever's placed directly in front of you than you do turning around and running away.

There's a difference between crossing an obstacle course and picking up a statue that causes bolts to shoot from all the walls.

[ Clarke is going to get herself killed - and yes, that's not as permanent here, but it will still hurt. He tries to keep it less condescending, but if she's inclined to read it as condescion, she's going to do so.

He doesn't hop on the bike the second she's off it, but does step nearer to it. ]

I'm not part of the labyrinth, although I think the jury's out on whether we've been placed directly in front of each other. Did the labyrinth want you to steal the bike? Did it want me to give you a ride? Are we supposed to fight?

( desensitized to death as she is — indeed, the mysterious patient zero behind francis krouse's warning to them all — clarke does not want to die here again. which is the only reason she does not immediately roll her eyes at mention of darts coming flying out of the walls. indiana jones is a decent movie, the whip parts were cool, and one never knows where echo draws his inspiration from.

but at least in this specific scenario, there seem to be no labyrinth based tricks raining down on them here. he steps closer to the bike, she crosses her arms. )

I'd reckon it did it's part by leading me here and guess the rest is up to us. I didn't — ( successfully ) — steal your bike. Do you want to fight?

( she'd have rather driven herself of course, but is also wildly adaptable. if the offer of expedient travel through the maze is on the table, she'll snatch it. and if it comes down to a fight...

well, chances are she'd lose. but the tension of existing in this place has proven to be a lot. between running from a dragon, being separated from her friends, almost getting eaten alive, half drowning saving others from being eaten alive, and running herself ragged just trying to get to the exit in order to have a say in next months misery — anxiety has folded over on itself and molded into anger more than a few times. the desire to just hit something is strong. )

Edited 2024-05-27 05:29 (UTC)

Heck no, I don't want to fight.

[ The response is immediate, no hesitation. Despite the armor and weaponry, the preferred path is always a peaceful resolution. (And this isn't an altercation. It's an interaction.)

He shrugs, holding his palms out to the side. ]

I want to get as many people safely to the maze's end as possible before time runs out. I saw what Aurora was saying about it on the communicators. The oxygen from the city was piped into the labyrinth. There's not enough oxygen for both places. So when people start leaving the labyrinth... it might get real hard to breathe.

( that is...

a truly terrifying thought. and something clarke had not considered, which shows on her face with a sudden wave of blank shock that washes over her face. it melts a couple years off her features, but they gradually resettle in worry lines around the eyes, between her brows, and a sharp press of her mouth until her lips blanche white. she is well familiar with the effects of oxygen rationing, and the fall out of hypoxia. the labyrinth is already difficult enough to navigate with ones full faculties, but add in brain fog and dizziness? )

A lot of people could die... ( she mutters, mostly to herself. thanks for adding another layer of anxiety to her general state of being tim. it wasn't necessary, but it's cool. totally cool, it's fine, her heart totally didn't just bottom out with a refreshed reminder she's separated from her friends and can't even coach them through how to breathe when the air is thin so they don't pass out. )

MISSION 002

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