Somebody's gonna come undone (Ch. 4: Day 3, pt. II)

Greens · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 2:18 am

Behind the others strolled the oddly silent Ace, carrying the usual arrangement of materials. Bloody t-shirt, ruffled jacket, scuffed boots... and an Eggman Army duffel bag he found hidden away under the driver's seat. He carried it over the shoulder until he made it up to the back of the van, and unceremoniously plopped his rump on the edge. The bag was dumped over his knees. With a quick, unforgiving yank of the zipper, the cat inspected its contents while the others conversed.

Even as tired-looking as he was, he quirked a brow when a straight black hoodie appeared at the top of the pile. But he just rolled his eyes in distaste, and chuckled sardonically when he saw that hoodie was hiding a crowbar directly underneath it, sandwiched between a pair of grey camo shorts. (Even so, both the hoodie and crowbar were set directly beside him.) At least the mystery of whose car they'd relieved was solved. Though while he was secretly glad they made some success against Rock, stealing his clothes wasn't exactly a landmark in progress.

But a little more rummaging yielded more interesting results. Beyond the roll of duct tape and miscellaneous workshed tools, there lie a slim, but sturdy case made entirely of metal. Inside that case where a variety of... funky-looking gadgets and gizmos, shaped like world's most high-tech belts, all entirely black in color. In fact, there was something odd about how thorough its utter blackess was, almost as if light had difficulty reflecting on the surface...

"We didn't leave empty handed," he announced.

"Coop," he stated plainly, and tossed one of the devices in his direction. "You're tech-savvy. You know what these are?"

Kazz · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 2:29 am

"I'll be fine," Rodolf said to Geoff, pushing himself to stand upright. He wobbled for a second -- incredibly hard head or not, he had still gotten a tad knocked around, and he was dazed -- but with a concentrated effort, he planted his feet and stood upright. He looked at Coop at his remark, and shrugged the less banged-up of his shoulders. (The left, for what it was worth.)

"I've got anger management issues," the unicorn replied with a little bit of a sardonic smirk, his eyelids sliding half-closed. That explained enough. He may have said something more, but Ace gave his input then. He turned, and raised his eyebrows, but did not comment.

"I'm surrounded by lunatics."
That much was hardly audible, but Mako blinked a couple times, looking between Ace and whatever he had just thrown to the bird. ... he peered a bit closer at the unknown item, though careful to keep a healthy distance from the bird.

Diluss · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 2:38 am

Coop turned, and caught one of the objects awkwardly.

He looked at it.

“I dunno what this is,” he said, flatly, “I know how to break stuff—I don’t know about anything like this.”

He held the belt-like object at arm’s length and shook it gently. It wobbled slightly.

“...Beats me,” he said.

NPC · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 3:45 pm

Coop's intrepid efforts in gently wiggling the belt with reckless abandon resulted in the (previously hidden) clasp swinging open, allowing the belt to extend to full, open length.

Nothing happened.

Diluss · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 4:36 pm

“Bwoash—g—jgl—“

The eagle awkwardly juggled the piece of equipment that had slipped open from around his finger. He caught it.

“Auuuuugh,” he groaned, grabbing his injured shoulder.

“Nghm,” he added, after a few seconds staring at the thing in his hand—his other free hand still gently rubbing his shoulder, “looks like a belt.”

“...There’s no way it’d fit me though. Hey. Any volunteers? Unless it’s some kind of prison belt, or, uh. Explosive collar thing."

Greens · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 4:48 pm

"Maybe it'll fit around your neck," Ace half-mumbled.

Diluss · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 4:53 pm

“Ahah,” Coop replied sarcastically, but not some measure of humour.

He held the belt thing up in both hands.

...

“Hmm."

Mie · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 9:18 pm

Tabitha had been the last to exit their vehicle. While she was far from overly stimulated, or traumatized, or anything of the sort, she didn't seem terribly keen on participating in any of the numerous iterations of "what now," "that was close," or "whoo, what a ride"s going on around the room. She meandered aimlessly from the van, seeming to take in their surroundings with particular interest Ace's find, and the subsequent mystery surrounding it came to light. The marmalade striped cat made her way noiselessly over, scrutinizing the foreign objects from behind Coop when at last, she abruptly interjected.

"That's --" Her brow creased with the effort of summoning a blip of a memory from an otherwise eventful and chaotic occurrence.

"Tails said.... that's Nocturnal technology. Or something like that. It's from the ancient Echidna civilization."

After a brief glance around, in case it wasn't perfectly clear, Tabby added darkly, "He said it would be really bad if Eggman got his hands on it."

Diluss · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 9:23 pm

“Huh.”

“Hmph.”

Coop lifted it to his neck.

He lowered it again.

He lifted it half-way and then dropped one end, letting it swing from one hand. He watched it swing back and forth, and made a quiet grumbling noise in the back of his throat.

...

He placed the band around his neck and attempted to press the two ends together, under his chin.

NPC · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 9:25 pm

The gaps and seams of the paneled black metal belt suddenly glowed vivid cyan for a moment.

Coop's head disappeared.

Diluss · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 9:35 pm

There was a moment of silence.

“Hm, that was... kind of disappointing,” said Coop’s voice from beyond the ether.

After a moment of fumbling, the eagle managed to unclasp the belt and removed it from his neck. His head appeared again. He stared down at the belt with a furrowed brow.

“Huh,” he said, “I guess it—must be out of power or something. Or maybe there’s some way of turning it on.”

He looked up at the rest of the group, “either way, I’m not going to walk around with this thing around my neck until we figure out what it’s supposed to do."

Sheff · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 10:02 pm

After Rodolph's claims of being a-okay, Geoff just shrugged and let the matter be. The unicorn had some toughness in him. That, at least, was evident.

He glanced over to the others then, wondering if they were making any progress to what the next actual plan was, but he was temporarily distracted by Coop's fiddling with the belt. He overheard Tabitha make some claim about Noctur-something-or-another, his eyes darting to her for a moment. Whatever she had tried to say sounded a bit too familiar for his liking.

Looking back to the eagle, he was about to make a statement when...

...Coop's head vanished.

"....."

Cue long silence as Coop claimed its temporary uselessness, proceeding to let his head pop back into existence again.

Geoff lifted a finger, idly pointing at the bird, his mouth slightly open as he considered what to say.

"...uh... your head... just... poof. Gone. When you put that on."

Diluss · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 11:48 pm

Coop looked at the belt in his hands.

He jumped a little, as what the hedgehog said sank in.

“...What,” he said, “really? Wh—“

“Here, one of you put this on,” he said, holding the device out to the group.

“Properly, this time."

Sheff · Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2011 11:59 pm

Another pause from the hedgehog.

"...fine."

Geoff reached out, snatching the belt from the eagle. Examining it, he held it away from his body like he was holding a particularly foul piece of laundry.

"Well... isn't like this thing killed you or something."

Gradually, he brought it closer, snaking it around his waist. After a brief moment, he brought the two ends closer, barely an inch from each other. There they paused, Geoff considering the consequences of wearing this strange, alien technology. His only consolation was that Coop's head was still tightly secured on his body and not a blackened pile of ash.

He clicked the belt together before he could hesitate any longer.

NPC · Posted: Thu Dec 22, 2011 12:25 am

The belt lit again, but no disappearing act occurred this time. Instead, completely foreign-looking script symbols appeared, glowing on the black surface. Even though they were unreadable, they appeared almost unmistakably as buttons, matching up with slightly raised, seamed areas on the belt's surface, pulsating several times before fading. Geoff's more delicate touch had apparently failed to fatfinger one of them the way Coop's huge meat-hands had.

Somebody's gonna come undone (Ch. 4: Day 3, pt. II)

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