When All Else Fails (RP)

Started by Ivy Mariani, October 17, 2010, 11:05:46 AM

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Raphael

His laughter stopped when he heard the retinal scanner sliding over the floor and he saw it bounce off the open door and stop there. Good thinking, doctor. He stood there, looking at the little gadget, and licked his dry lips. God, he would kill a man for a cup of tea right now.

"OKAY! I'm going to reach out and take the scanner. So don't shoot!" He slowly squatted down in the corner, the scanner was at his feet. He looked around but there was nothing he could use to pull it in. He had to expose his hand when reaching for it. Oh well. Rob wasn't the bravest man there is but he was far from being a coward. He was a warrior, after all. Even the tune on his cell phone once was a popular heavy metal song, "I'm a Fighter Not a Lover". He smiled to the memory, but his smile was sad. He was never going to hear that song again, one of the millions of things that got lost back on Earth after the virus broke out.

He reached out and his fingers wrapped themselves around the retinal scanner - not fast but not slow either. He doubted anyone could shoot through his arm from across the hall, and even so, the wound wouldn't be fatal. Dr Seris and her trust was much more important - especially in this wretched situation the facility was in. He began to slowly pull it in. Nothing happened.

He got up and turned the scanner. He saw the frozen image and examined it carefully. He wasn't an expert but he had been dealing with the virus forever, and he had been living with and around scientists long enough. Everything seemed perfectly fine and Rob smiled. Finally, a piece of good news.

"You have pretty eyes, Terra," he said. He was still smiling. He looked back - he was still alone in the hallway. He nodded. He wasn't sure if the image on the scanner was Terra's. He couldn't be. But he was tired of being paranoid and he decided to risk it.

"Everything seems fine. You're not infected. So here's what I'm gonna do. I'm going to slowly come out with my hands up. Right? Then you can examine me at gunpoint. I have no fucking idea how to operate this thing, anyhow. I'm coming out, Dr Seris!" And slowly, very slowly he showed himself at the door frame, hands in the air, gun pointing at the ceiling.

Ivy Mariani

 Listening to him she rolled her eyes. Of all the things she wanted to hear in that exact moment that hadn't been one of them. A simple, I'll do the scan and slide it back would have sufficed, but the fact he hadn't known how to use the scanner hadn't surprised her much. It took her a solid month to get the details down as to how to work the scanner without getting false positives. And that was on cadavers.

Keeping the gun steady she watched him. "Put the gun down Sarge." she kept her voice steady despite the fact her mind was racing and she felt like her heart was about to explode if it beat any harder. "Once it's on the floor kick it over towards me." she wanted to be sure she had one less weapon to worry about. He outweighed her, that was more than easy to know. But she could have an advantage with an extra weapon not being in the mix.

"I'll talk you through the scan, but I want you to stay there. Just being cautious." she tried to reassure him that her trusts weren't misplaced. She was tired of not being able to trust in those she had grown to know, but right now it was easy to understand why that trust was being shattered. Her fingers threatened to shake, which in turn would cause the gun within her hand to move and give away the fact that she was terrified. She had to remain calm about this.
"Put your hands all over me."
Ivy's O & Os

Raphael

Rob shook his head. Throw his weapon? Not gonna happen. Not with all three levels of the Terrosphere unexplored with math knows how many infected roaming about waiting to bite into his jugular vein.

"Look around you, doctor. See the corpses? That's the work of an infected. And a pretty fucked up one, at that. And they might still be around, for all I know. I am not going to disarm myself if I'm to stand here with my back against the hallway. You can see pretty clearly by now that I'm not a threat to you, so even if I'm infected I ain't deranged yet. So you decide - either you come to me and watch my back while examining me, or talk me through it but the gun stays with me. Or hell, shoot me if it would make you feel better."

He took a deep breath. His arms were starting to get tired. His throat was so sore he felt every breath painful. His eyes were filled with dust, itching badly. His back was sweaty, his feet were tired. He was hoping she would make her decision before he solves her problem by simply collapsing. 'Hold on, Hound Dog, you've been through worse,' he said to himself. He looked over his shoulder. The hallway was empty but he thought he saw something move on the far end. With the condition of his eyes, he couldn't be sure. He slowly stepped aside and closed the door with his foot.

"Something might be coming our way," he added calmly. "Not sure, but I thought I saw something move. So be on your toes."

Ivy Mariani

 She sighed, her gun had drooped a little but it was now lifted back where it had been. "Look.. I've got a clear view of the hallway from here. Either you trust me and drop your gun, or I start firing and my aim isn't that great. I might end up clipping something vital." her voice was solid, but her tone sounded a little weird. "You'll need both hands to work this thing if you're not used to it anyways." she'd managed it with one but it had been difficult as hell.

She glanced down the hall but was still able to see him clearly in her line of sight as well. "It could be Dr Franklin. He practically lives here, as it is I need to talk to him. I'm pretty sure I can explain all of this, but first.. The scan." she moved her eyes back to him, but kept glancing back down the hall just to be on the safe side. "Either way.. If you don't do the scan I'm walking out of here. I'm sure there are a lot of scared and hurt people here who still need help."

She wasn't opposed to simply slipping back out of the Terrosphere and to one of the other levels. She doubted anyone was alive but she could hole up somewhere until help came at least.
"Put your hands all over me."
Ivy's O & Os

Raphael

He really hated arguing with women. They usually made no sense to anyone but themselves.

"You want me to trust you and drop my gun, and then you admit your aim isn't great. Seriously, doctor, do you think you could protect me from there? Besides, like I said, I am no threat. If I was, you'd be dead by now. What's so damn important about losing the one man's trust that you still have?" He was starting to get pissed off.

"Shoot me or leave, if you insist. I'll go back and tend to the wounded locked up with Luc in the lab back there cos I sure as hell am a better doctor than you." He sighed. He'd seen people freaked out by the virus before. Acting the way Dr Seris was - nervous, paranoid, and ultimately stupid. The virus affected everybody in a different way, but all infected had one thing in common - complete lack of rational behavior. Which is to say - behavior like the one he was displaying. The doctor must be pretty shaken up to act like she was, Rob thought.

He thought about it for a second.

"Look, I'll put the gun on the back of my pants. That way you'll have plenty of time to shoot me if I start getting weird, aye? Think about it."

Ivy Mariani

 His words stung her more than she cared to admit. She was a lot younger than most of the other doctors who had been here, but she also had the most experience not only with the military aspect of the facility but also with the medical expectations. Her eyes fell to the floor as her gun drooped. She wasn't sure if he'd meant to say it, but regardless of the intent, the words hurt her none the less.

Slumping back against the wall she was now caught between going back out into the unknown, facing whatever was out there with her multitude of weapons.. Or sitting in the lab with everyone else, doing nothing because now it seemed it was all she was good for. The barrel of her gun dropped even further as she hung her head, her hair falling about her face.

"Fine..." she muttered, still not trusting that he wasn't entirely uninfected. At this point now, she wasn't sure she cared anymore. "Do... Do whatever you want.."
"Put your hands all over me."
Ivy's O & Os

Raphael

The sergeant was surprised to see her break down like this all of a sudden. He didn't take his eyes off her. Suddenly he realized that she wasn't simply a young woman in the middle of a freakshow. She was also the head of the facility - and the facility was falling apart around her. Her people were dying, her research was being destroyed. Poor Terra, he thought, suddenly softened. He stood there helpless, with his hands up like an ape in uniform, not sure what to do. Finally he decided.

"OK, alright," he said quietly. "Look. I'm putting the gun down. See? Now you come here and give me that damn scan because I'm pretty sure I hear noises behind that door and I don't wanna stand around when the insane Da Vinci walks in and decided my body is due for an impressionist work of art, right? It's alright, Terra, I'm not infected, goddam it!"

He slowly lowered his body and put the Showstopper on the floor next to his feet. He took another step away from the door. The gun was in a position that would allow him to grab it while tumbling forward, if the situation required it. "See," he repeated. "It's down. Nothing to worry about. Keep the gun at me if you want, just don't shoot me before you scan me..." His words faded. His throat really hurt.

LucianLuna

Lucian watched Rob go investigate the noise, shutting the door behind him as the man left. He then found a table and laid a cloth on it then set out bottles of water for the others. They probably needed some after the hike down here. Lucian took one as well and started to drink it while keeping his eyes on the door in case someone tried to come in. he had no idea what was out there, but he was going to make sure he protected the group that was with him. Until Rob got back, if Rob got back, he was all this group had and he was going to make sure he did good by them. He wondered if Doc had survived or if she was like the rest of her group. he hoped she had survived, he kind of liked Doc in a friend sort of way.

Ivy Mariani

#83
 Still not feeling like herself, she took small steps forward, her gun still lowered and her feet seeming to drag. His words had been a bigger blow to her psyche than he cared to admit. She'd fought so hard to be someone who could help others, as it was she had failed to save her family.

"Give me the scanner.." her voice was fragile, threatening to break at any moment despite her desperate attempts to keep her composure. She didn't want to do this scan. She didn't want any of this to be happening. She was hoping that at any moment she would wake up in bed, safe and at home back on Earth. However that wasn't a possibility. That reality was so far off base from what she was living through in this moment.
"Put your hands all over me."
Ivy's O & Os

Raphael

Sarge slowly handed her the device and stood still. He was observing her breakdown and he felt saddened to see the cheerful and witty doctor Seris like this. He wanted to encourage her but the corpsy environment lacked the inspiration. Still, he gave it a try.

"Terra... I know you're pretty shook up. But it's going to be alright. All the civilians are safe, 'cept one who died of... blood cloth or whatever they call it on the way here. Many died, the facility is in ruin... but we'll repair it, right? People in the main settlements are safe and shagging like crazy, and soon we will gain in numbers again." He forced a laugh out of his chest through the pain of his throat. He just wanted to see her smile. "Don't worry, one day your children will grumbling cos they don't wanna get up for school, and you'll be playing the hard mom scolding them and fixing their little uniforms... and all of this will be just a faded memory."

Not half bad, he thought. He hoped it worked on her. Surprisingly enough, it worked on him and he felt his spirit picking up again. He nodded to the retinal scanner. "Let's get this over with so that we can plan an assault on Luc's food cart. I swear I could eat..." his eyes circled around the abundance of mutilated human flesh along the floor, "... a lot of vegetables."

Ivy Mariani

 Grabbing the scanner Terra cleared the image in silence. She wasn't sure what to say anymore, unsure if there was really much left she could say. Her mind was numb, body operating on some form of autopilot that she couldn't figure out how to shut off. Frankly she wasn't sure she wanted to turn it off. She waited for the image to clear completely before holding it up and taking a quick shot, her own eyes looking down the hallway to make sure nothing was in fact coming down towards them.

Seeing nothing she had turned her attention back to the scanner waiting for the new image to show. Seeing it was clear she nodded before clearing the new image and tucking the scanner away. Having dropped her back just inside the doorway of the Terrosphere she went and collected it. While there wasn't much in it now, it would at least be something. It was a first that she had noticed she had carried the thing all the way down the hallways and into the area. The weight hadn't been noticeable in her adrenaline rush she was dealing with earlier.
"Put your hands all over me."
Ivy's O & Os

Raphael

Rob waited patiently for Dr Seris to finish the scan. Her nod confirmed what he knew - he was clean. What surprised him was that she didn't say anything, she didn't find any form of hope or encouragement. She was walking around like a zombie with a flat expression. He shrugged. The situation was wearing them out, but he was a soldier - this kind of stress wasn't new to him. Besides, he figured she was much smarter than him and her brain must have found angles of despair and hopelessness that his couldn't.

Immediately after the scan he picked up his gun and double-checked it to make sure it was fully operational. "Doc, let me take you to the others," he said to Terra, his voice low and quiet. He turned around and opened the door.

The shape of a man flashed for a second at the opposite end of the hallway and disappeared to the right. Sarge remembered that to the right were the stairs to the lower levels of the Terrosphere. Now he knew they weren't alone. But Dr Seris' safety should come first, he reminded himself. Rule number one - set up a clean perimeter.

"Terra," he said. "I saw a man running towards the lower levels. Not sure who or what he was - couldn't get a clear view."

Ivy Mariani

 Terra raked her fingers through her hair, slipping the large weapon she'd been carrying back into the large duffel she once again draped over her shoulders so the bag could rest against her back. Reaching down as she crouched, she pulled the  small hand gun from the holster she had on her ankle. Getting a bullet into the chamber she held the gun at arms length, barrel pointed towards the floor as she started cautiously down the hallway.

"It's likely Dr Franklin." she whispered only loud enough to fill the space between herself and the Sarge as she passed. Still she didn't want to take any risks. Once she was past Sarge she leveled her weapon, holding it steadily out in front of herself. As she approached each doorway to a lab- ones that were open at least- she swiveled her body, checking into each room to make sure they were clear before she proceeded onward.

She wanted to find Franklin, to grill him about what he had done. Chances were he was the one behind this. The man was practically insane, but everyone labeled him as some form of scientific genius. She had never trusted him, never wanted him in her facility but even she had people she needed to answer to, people she couldn't say no to. It sucked, but it was part of her job. Whether she had to kill this man for all of the lives he had taken, or whether she just needed to lock him up, was something she'd need to wait to find out.
"Put your hands all over me."
Ivy's O & Os

Raphael

Rob watched Dr Seris move out and followed behind, watching out for anything that could come from anywhere, including the ceiling. While she was making her way down the hallway, he carefully knocked on the lab doors where the civilians were staying.

"It's sarge," he said through the door. "Don't open. Luc - I think we've got company. Me and Dr Seris are doing a sweep - she's with me and she's fine. If you've heard a gunshot - that was her saying "hello" to me, ha-ha."

He gave doc an apologetic look. "It's not like they don't know we're here," his lips said. He continued walking forward, a few yards behind her, watching her back.

Behind sarge and the doctor, the doors to the Terrosphere swung open and a man entered. He was well over 6'4 tall and had no clothes on except for a long white lab coat, torn apart and covered in blood, and blue jeans that were in such a bad shape it was hard to believe they were still hanging from his body. His dead gray eyes looked around the corpse-covered floor and he chuckled quietly in approval. He made a little dance in the middle of the room, enjoying the smell of death and decay, and then he spotted something that made him say:

"Oh boy, candy, oh boy, candy!" He kept saying it over and over again as he yanked a long kitchen knife out of a corpse's ribcage and licked it thoughtfully.

"Too much iron in your blood!" he chuckled. "Oh boy, candy!"

With the knife in his hand, he crept up forward, stopping occasionally, lost in thoughts. When he opened the door to the hallway, it was empty. His nose perked up as he sniffed the air.

"Oh boy, candy!" he said quietly, and his eyes narrowed. It smelled like people. And the smell led to a closed door. He stood in front of it, thinking about books he had read as a child, or maybe someone else had read as a child, he wasn't sure.

Then he reached out and scratched down the door with the tip of the knife.

LucianLuna

Lucian jumped when there was a knock on the door, relieved it was just Rob.  "Ok Rob, I'll keep them safe. You guys be careful out there."  He listened to Rob's footsteps walk away and then a little while later he heard something else, something scraping against the door. He motioned to the civilians to not make any noise and for them to move to the back of the room then stood in front of them with his gun aimed at the door. If he was going down he was gonna go down fighting and protecting the others.

Raphael

He closed his eyes, enjoying the sound of the knife scraping against the door. He knew there were people inside - living people. He could smell them. They were his 'candy'.

But nothing happened. His dead eyes gazed upon the door. He licked his lips and reached out to press the button. But they wouldn't open. He pressed the button again and smiled.

"Oh, games," he said. He pressed the button with the tip of the knife, then with the butt. When still nothing happened, he took a few steps back. He laughed. He licked the knife.

He leaped forward and the heel of his right foot smashed against the door.

The door was not steel. It was some synthetic plastic, hard, reinforced, but not unbreakable. It cracked. The infected man thrust his heel into the crack again. And this time, the door broke down.

LucianLuna

Lucian was ready and as soon as the door broke he was firing through it before he could see the man on the other side, if they broke the door then it has to be one of the infected. He kept firing as he talked to the group.  "Stay behind me! I'll hold him off as best I can! Let's hope the othhers get here in time if I can't kill this guy!"