The BLAME! Game

Milos nods and responds: "Well what an ironic situation. A program made so faulty that it wants to fix itself, but can't, and the only things programmed access to fix it are the ones who made it faulty in the first place. The program itself doesn't have admin access." He shakes his head and hangs it down. "A self aware AI at the mercy of others. Slavery--safeguards, slaves; the Netsphere itself, a slave to its creators who couldn't make it last, too weak to fix it all these years..." He looks up at the others with a different look in his eyes. "Not to say we can't fix it now! Let us be slaves no longer!"

Nathanial sighs, taking in all of the information thus far. It's safe to assume that we're not going to be let off of the hook so easily, and I can assume that the only way out of here is to comply with that thing's wishes... "Alright, I'll join in. Since we're all going to be working together, my name's Nathanial." His next comment is made as he looks directly towards the Controller, "I'm assuming you're going to be useless from this point on, pointing us in the direction that we need to go... it's seems as though you're quite capable of taking care of your chores by yourself if something weren't limiting you."

The controller AI looks again at Nathanial and begins to speak, with the slightest tinge of mechanical feeling in his words. "Yes, you are correct. There are certain safeguards that limit my effective range and usefulness. Not only that, but I am merely a visage, more a bundle of energy given reason than a tangible machine able to assist you. However, I will be giving you direction. It seems most of you have reached an agreement, so I ask now of you to cooperate. You are in a railway system that has long gone unused, but it is not beyond repair. Finding a rail car to ride, powering it, and avoiding danger should be an easy task, as the safeguard are thin in these unpopulated areas." He then turns around and looks at the branching paths up ahead.

"Both of these paths lead to the same area, however the left one will run by the rail station, which will accelerate your path to Toha. The right will simply take you directly there, but you will have to walk. I suggest haste; the safeguard are no doubt aware of my newly awakened presence, and I have no doubt they aim to interfere. When you get to Toha, you should speak to the local humans, as they can help familiarize you with the area and hint to where information may be found. I must go now, as I have stayed too long and wish to attract no more attention. Good luck, as they say, although I feel that our Nathanial may not like such random things." Right as he fades away, the controller seems to put on a puzzled face, like there was an unexpressed emotion that he we was trying to represent but could not.

Options: Discuss with teammates, ponder, whatever you wanna do, or go down the fucking rail line already

Milos tries to remember how fast a rail car can go...

>500mph

Not much of a choice besides to comply; I can't exactly go back to what I was doing, and the Netsphere needs saving anyways. A little nanomachine reprogramming, perhaps... okay a lot, maybe, after getting the Net Terminal Gene. Furthermore, I'm actually safer now in a group with others, even though at the moment the only thing binding us is a common goal. Alright then, off to Toha... time to find a ride.

"Well, when we find a rail car we can accelerate it to 500mph, if my memory is correct; that is a lot faster than I can walk. I think I'll head left, then." He takes a few steps in that direction until he is several yards ahead of the group, then he turns. "Shall we go as one, or would some prefer to walk on their own down the right? Or does anyone have a different plan?"

"Well, I'm gonna go down the right path. Faster and more direct. Anyone gonna follow me? If so, speak up now before I leave."
Max takes a quick glance at his party, then takes a few steps toward the right path, now a few meters away from the group.
"Who am I kidding, none of you are gonna come with me anyway.."

"I'll check the right path to make sure he wasn't lying to us about which had the railcar." Eva says in his robotic voice.

After hearing their responses, he dashes off down the right path.

(Feel free too actually post a response)

"Oh no you don't!" Max sprints after Eva, twirling his sword in a circling motion while sprinting alongside him. "Think you can keep up?" Max hastens his pace.

Whilst Eva runs he leans down and begins running on all fours like an animal. Also whilst running he bends his knees backwards and uses his back legs like a panther.

Max stabilizes with Eva's pace. "So our mission is to get to Toha, ask people where the net terminal gene is, and repair the net sphere? Why don't we just destroy it since all it has done is bring chaos? Doesn't that sound smarter?"

Eva grunts in response to Max's question, activating his gauntlets, at 25%, to give him a speed boost as he runs, A human should be satisfied with a non-committal response.

(with my gauntlets on we both are 450, can't go above 25% while running)

Walking seems like a pain in the ass right now. But there is the safeguard I'd have to travel with. Hmmm After a moment of pondering, Lloyd walks to the left path along with Milos. At the least, the company will be interesting.

Posting for kevin
...
Nathaniel goes down the left tunnel following Milos.

10 Minutes pass.

Eva and Max are approx. 72 miles down the tunnel, Milos, Nathaniel, and Lloyd are only a few miles down.

Whilst going down the right path, Eva and Max pass bright blue lights that shine from the lowered ceiling. Directly ahead down the path is a sharp right turn, and a splash of crimson can be seen with a bony silhouette

Milos, Nathaniel, and Lloyd come across the railcar station. In the middle on the rails is a flat cart with raised sides, and a simple control panel right in the middle. The panel is not damaged, but the display is dark and it looks very old. On either side are elevated, recessed platforms with short stairs that allow access to the car. There is a normal sized door on the left platform in the wall that reads "Control room." Everyone notices that there are no lights all down the tunnel.

(I'll keep doing it like I was, if you post to examine I'll edit your post to let you know what there is to see, but only if you're looking at something no one else is, and looking at things I already described might let you know more about it. I'll try to make it so everyone doesn't have to examine the same thing to get the same information.)

Well, there it is, just like he said. Now, to get this railcar moving... Doesn't seem to be any power, so let's look for a way to power it. Milos examines the control panel on the railcar as he approaches the door that reads "Control room."

Standing by the door, he says "So, think there might be a way to start this thing in here?"

>Milos sees that there are the numbers 2735 on the top of the panel, but otherwise it's plain as can be.

Max says "What the hell is that?" and examines the silhouette further.

>Max sees that the shadow has large, sharp protrusions from it's back, and that it's hunched over.

"Only one way to find out." Lloyd replies to Milos before opening the door without a second thought. Here's to hoping this isn't booby trapped in some way.

Eva slows as he sees the shadow, reverting to his humanoid posture and deactivating his gloves.

"Probably in the control room Sparky." Nathaniel replies to Milos as he proceeds to follow Lloyd.

Nathanial, Milos, and Lloyd see that the control room has one large panel in the center, and set into the wall opposite is a huge generator labeled "Core System." The generator is very obviously out of service, but doesn't have any damage on the outside. Even so, it looks very old and out-of-date compared to current tech.

The silhouette in front of Max and Eva stands and appears very tall, then suddenly sprints away, the sound of crunching and bending metal left in it's wake.

Milos walks towards the center of the room, examining the control panel and the generator, looking for a way to possibly turn the generator on.

> (Tech ability high) Milos notices that the panel is of an older make, but should be directly connected to the power source, and will turn on when it receives power. This could be done by directly applying an electrical current to make it activate, as long as you sustain said current, or the power that normally supplies it is turned on.

As for the generator, it is also older, and has a small but basic hatch on the front, which can be opened. However, from Milos' strong ability of the tech, he already knows that the generator is set to run mostly infinitely, which tells him that this tunnel was an automated supply line before it went out of use, and was either damaged or manually disabled in some way. This obviously has several implications which I will not spoil.

"What was that...?" Max begins running after the silhouette.

"Ah, the generator is down. Once restored, it should provide enough power to set us on our way. Would either of you like to take a look?" He gestures towards the generator.

Though these things don't shut down on their own... someone or something must have caused this. Disrupted supply lines near Toha Industries, rumored to contain the Net Gene... could the rumors be true, if someone would try to prevent access to this place? And if so, would they not do more permanent damage? --Error. Not enough data. Proceed as normal.

Eva resumes his previous stance and, activating his gloves, follows Max after the silhouette.

Lloyd steps forward, "I guess I will." He says before examining the generator, looking for a way to restore power.

> There's a hatch. Open it. The rest of it is just an off-brownish color, with the label at the top.

Lloyd steps forward, "I guess I will." He says before opening the hatch on the generator, looking for basic damage or cut wires.

> The hatch is about 5ftx5ft, from here you can see it opens up and can be crawled into, with just enough room to stand in. There's the core in the center, with a large main wire coming from the bottom. There is a small panel on the opposite side with physical buttons on it, but don't worry about that because your tech ability tells you those don't matter except for the red start button.

The core is basically a collector that transfers the energy down the main wire that then connects to a transmitter, which wirelessly sends energy to the stations in the surrounding area. There are most likely thousands of these in this area. The core is undamaged, but is off-center and needs to be lifted and replaced. This will take time, however it is fairly simple to do and could have been done by Max if he was given instructions. The holder will also need to be bent back into place. Then, the button will need to be pressed, which will send the energy back through the core and hopefully restore power to the station.

Do you wish to proceed with moving the core, or would you rather discuss with the others your options? (2 turns to repair, 1 turn to press the button and the generator to start in earnest, not necessarily combat but the person repairing cannot fight. And this one is gonna be combat so fuck you )

> Max and Eva rush around the corner and see the walls splattered with blood. Human bones, augmented and otherwise, are all across the floor. Most of the bodies are mangled to the extreme, and are barely recognizable. The walls and floor are dented, as if a monster weighing thousands of pounds had walked through. There are obvious imprints on the ground where it ran away, each imprint almost a foot deep. It's a grizzly scene. The silhouette is also nowhere to be seen, although with sufficient speed you could catch him.

Max and Eva feel residual energy from the imprints.

You can either keep chasing or stop to examine the scene. No time will be in lost in chasing in between turns, but you'll probably lose him if you stop chasing.