( system monitor v.2 ) (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
amplifying) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
thearena2013-04-02 01:00 am
amplifying) wrote in thearena2013-04-02 01:00 am
Entry tags:
dinner (open for hungry undead beings)
Who_ R, Javert, Karis, and Beck
What_ There are some hungry zombies in Disneyland, and Beck is hot on the menu.
Where_ Somewhere around, wherever you want!
When_ Some time during week three.
Warnings/Notes_ Gore, zombie violence, cannibalism and a little bit of character death!
So the Games aren't easy. Beck has come to that conclusion...Not that his games were any easier, though. Especially when you had one of those 'one rule' type things to keep.
When he hadn't been migrating from one end of the Arena to the other, Beck found himself thinking back to that one cycle. And most of the time, he ended up comparing that game experience to this Game experience. Most of the time, he really didn't come up with any life-changing answers.
Even though he had played in games similar to these in Argon, there were many things that were different. Things were stretched out here, to the point where it felt like an itch. You didn't know who was dying now or who wasn't, or what would be out to get you in one building and not the next. It seemed like people liked it this way...which he couldn't imagine why. He couldn't imagine why anybody liked these Games, let alone any other kind of reasoning behind it. But it bothered him all the same. It was all about derezzing...- killing, just for entertainment. He was now a few cycles into this, and Beck was doing okay. Not only was he alive, but he hadn't killed a single person or thing.
And that he was proud of.
He was thinking about this now as he settled down in his small little 'shelter', nibbling on whatever provisions he managed to snag from the Fantasyland Feast. But it didn't last for long; with a sudden flash, and a jerk from his human body, Beck felt himself glitch...and all of his memories of the past few weeks were gone. He felt the panic grow as he took a look around. And then came the questions of: where am I? What am I doing here? Why is this....-
But as quickly as the glitch came, it left. His memories returned with the snap of the fingers, leaving him a little tired, and a little shaken...but okay. Yeah, Beck was still okay.
What_ There are some hungry zombies in Disneyland, and Beck is hot on the menu.
Where_ Somewhere around, wherever you want!
When_ Some time during week three.
Warnings/Notes_ Gore, zombie violence, cannibalism and a little bit of character death!
So the Games aren't easy. Beck has come to that conclusion...Not that his games were any easier, though. Especially when you had one of those 'one rule' type things to keep.
When he hadn't been migrating from one end of the Arena to the other, Beck found himself thinking back to that one cycle. And most of the time, he ended up comparing that game experience to this Game experience. Most of the time, he really didn't come up with any life-changing answers.
Even though he had played in games similar to these in Argon, there were many things that were different. Things were stretched out here, to the point where it felt like an itch. You didn't know who was dying now or who wasn't, or what would be out to get you in one building and not the next. It seemed like people liked it this way...which he couldn't imagine why. He couldn't imagine why anybody liked these Games, let alone any other kind of reasoning behind it. But it bothered him all the same. It was all about derezzing...- killing, just for entertainment. He was now a few cycles into this, and Beck was doing okay. Not only was he alive, but he hadn't killed a single person or thing.
And that he was proud of.
He was thinking about this now as he settled down in his small little 'shelter', nibbling on whatever provisions he managed to snag from the Fantasyland Feast. But it didn't last for long; with a sudden flash, and a jerk from his human body, Beck felt himself glitch...and all of his memories of the past few weeks were gone. He felt the panic grow as he took a look around. And then came the questions of: where am I? What am I doing here? Why is this....-
But as quickly as the glitch came, it left. His memories returned with the snap of the fingers, leaving him a little tired, and a little shaken...but okay. Yeah, Beck was still okay.
no subject
He's not sure what to do with the new guy trailing along. Newbie threw him a name that sounds like "Air" (weird name) and he's almost as game about talking as R is. It's almost distracting enough to forget about being hungry. R’s sure once they both eat, stuff themselves stupid, then they can actually have a real conversation. He’ll probably need time to work out what to say. So far Air isn’t holding grudges or glaring death at the back of his head. It could be worse.
R takes the lead without realizing it, a few times turning to find that Air’s bumped his way into another hedge as they head deeper into Fantasyland. The things are corpse magnets, because he swears the new guy will find a hedge that wasn’t there before and get stuck in it. Maybe he had a thing for them when he was alive. Who even knows? R isn’t sure if it’s guilt or what that makes him wheel around, twisting on his broken ankle to shuffle back and push Air into a more-or-less standing position. Somehow R feels responsible – as responsible as he can feel with his thoughts shifting through his fingers – and the least he can do is give Air the crash course in being the new zombie on the block.
“Nuh...No!” R strains to get words out instead of defaulting to groans. “Follow…t-this way. Under…stand?”
He stares into the other zombie’s eyes, searching for that person he killed inside, thinking he might see a ghost, a shred. They both have the same color eyes now: gray, like a fogged-up mirror and just as flat. After a long few minutes of staring, R throws in the towel. Food’ll help. Even if it doesn’t, he still wants it and if he does, then the newbie wants it even more. Staring at how relatively clean his mouth is, R bets he hasn’t even fed before.
R goes back to leading their little pack of two. He’s not used to checking if the other zombie is there. There are…uh, well, there aren’t exactly written or even spoken rules, but if he goes hunting somewhere, it’s kinda implied any other Dead should follow, no ifs ands or buts. R tries to stand up straighter, his good eye roving as he sniffs loudly. Another Living scent, pulling at his corpse. Close. Close-ish. R grunts out for the new zombie to follow him as he starts homing on the scent. The soft clink of something, like a metal canister, draws his attention as they round a bend and approach a ruined restaurant.
no subject
He stops too and sniffs. He isn't as experienced as R is, but he feels instinctively how they should approach. He has no way of knowing that it's because of his police training in his life as the living, of pursuing hunted men and of approaching dens of villainy. He reaches a hand up to his mouth as if to shush R.
Smells like food. Smells like a Living human. Something in him feels somewhat sick at the idea of murdering a person and feasting on their flesh, but that feeling is easily overcome by the much greater hunger, that much, much greater hunger.
A finger snaps.
Javert points.
no subject
"What is it?" she hisses as she catches up to the pair. Food? Another tribute? Something to kill? She's intensely curious and she pauses to sniff the air. Something (or someone) is around here somewhere....
no subject
"Food. Help..?" R groans. He flops a hand out to Javert, smacks him in the chest on accident because he swings too wide. "Air. Kar...is."
And that should cover the intros. He hates long gasping intros. R's arm drops to his side.
Only seconds ago he'd been the zombie with the plan, the dead guy playing at Follow the Leader. Now that Karis is here, R falls back into the follower roll without missing a beat or even noticing. It's just the way of things. Run into a Dead even more motivated than you and they got to drive the bus. R watches, mute, as Karis sniffs the air and gets pinged by the same things he was. They're close, whoever these Living are. Could be one. Could be more than one. Either way, they're close enough that R leans toward that restaurant with the broken windows and the splintered chairs across the patio and starts trying to drool. With the three of them, their odds shoot up higher than trying to solo this.
no subject
But he's a clever zombie, despite not really knowing who he is or what he's doing here or anything besides hunger. He doesn't go straight into the restaurant but instead walks around it, casing it out. And when he sees the chairs at the patio, he tips one over and starts to drag it, then, uncoordinately, arduously, jams it to block one of the doors.
Two entrance-exits from the building. Now there's only one.
"Other...side..." He gestures with his hand to the other door. Their prey is within. He shuffles over to the other door and tries to shove it open - only to realize that, to their luck, it isn't even locked.
no subject
Beck sighed and let a hand run through his hair, before let his chin rest on his hand. If the users behind this all and the ones watching it at home were wondering, he wasn't quite enjoying himself here. They probably knew that, too. And if the programs at Argon didn't care during their games, the chances of the users caring here were pretty slim too.
A noise outside captured his attention for about...oh, one second. It sounded like something banging into something else, but despite his training, and all that he had been through, he dismissed it. Things were old and unused here, and there had been a few times prior where he had been taken aback by a piece of a ride falling off to the ground, or a rusty-something making a racket nearby. This place was old and falling apart. He found himself lucky that this place was as nice as it was, and not falling over his head or anything like that.
Beck sighed and brought his legs up to his chest, his cheek resting on a knee. Maybe it was a good time to get some sleep, if nothing big was going on. The more energy he had the better he would be, anyway...-
Before he could even close his eyes, a louder, much closer noise nearby started him out of his sleepy thoughts. Beck propelled himself upwards, stumbling as he was suddenly thrown into the present. And now was the time for him to slap himself for not paying more attention to the noises outside...
He didn't even have any time to pack before the strangers made themselves known. Beck had gotten out of problems before by talking...maybe he could do the same here. "What do you want?"
no subject
Her voice is a taunting, sickly-sweet sing-song, a rasp from out of the gloom, "Knock, knock..."
She grins, showing off all of her teeth as she starts to stalk deeper into the building.
"Oh, we don't want a whole lot. Just a bite to eat. You know, cup of sugar, give to a needy neighbor - all of that kinda stuff. You can spare something, can't you?"
She's talking like a this is perfectly normal. Like she really is here to borrow something and then go on her merry way again. There's a distinct tone of menace to it, though. Beneath the false, sickly cheeriness there's a gleeful sadism that starts to bubble to the surface. Then it comes boiling out in a nasty-sounding chuckle.
"...if you fight, this might hurt a bit more than it has to."
She wants him to fight. She wants to make it hurt. It's why she's here.
no subject
She wants her food scared.
R realizes after a moment that his mouth is doing things on its own. His teeth are exposed, lips peeled back in a snarl. Wait, not a snarl. Scratch that. It's a grimace. And he's aiming it at Karis's back.
Let's just get it over with, he thinks, starting to translate that to actual words.
"Ghhgghl...krrk..." is what comes out, a loud, hungry moan punctuating Karis's threat.
Dammit.
R's eye adjusts to the darkness inside the restaurant as he shuffles around Karis to fan out, almost bumping shoulders with Air as they form a wall before the one exit. More overturned tables and chairs, counters that might've once held food, cashier registers that haven't actually served people in who knows how long. And then, like a gasp of fresh air, a Living man is standing before them with his stench overpowering in the enclosed space and firing up all of R's dead cells. R inhales despite himself. The grimace at Karis morphs into a hungry snarl as he daydreams about tackling the Tribute to the floor and sinking his teeth into his soft, warm, beating neck.
no subject
It's not as if their prey's done anything wrong, right? He doesn't deserve to be treated like scum. Or maybe Karis knows something that Javert and R don't. She does seem to be the sharpest tack among them.
And it's comforting to follow some sort of leadership like this, leadership that's telling him it's okay to want to grab this Living man, to sink his teeth into the man's flesh, to feel hot blood and taste muscle and sinew. They'll eat all of him, each piece. They won't be wasteful. Between the three of them, this man should be enough, at least for a little while.
"Make...fast..." he groans at Karis, slowly shuffling to flank Beck. Karis seems to want to do the honors, and honestly she's probably the one best suited for it. She's fast and lithe where he and R are stumbling, clumsy, disorderly goons.
no subject
Beck can only watch as not one person, but three walk in and close in, like they have a plan formed and everything. There's only one person he can recognize, and that was the one who helped crack his disc. But there's another user beside him, and one that has bright, yellow eyes. And that isn't even the worst part. No no, the worst part is her teeth.
...And the fact that she sounds a bit like Paige.
He looks around, taking a step backwards as they start to advance. It isn't until they were all standing before him that he figures it out; they had cut off his exit. The fact that there are chairs and tables and everything else scattered around certainly doesn't help Beck's situation none. He's standing in the spotlight, like a stray program with nowhere to go and nobody to turn to. There's no help here now, no weapons. And nowhere to go.
There were times where Beck was stuck in similar situations when he ran around as the Renegade. But at least he was in a city that he knew, and in a body that he recognized. He didn't have any of that now, and quite frankly? It was a pretty scary fact.
Beck won't kill. He can't do it, even if he's forced. But as one user moans something and the other growls, the idea becomes pretty clear that these three won't exactly see eye-to-eye with him. No, Beck won't kill...but he doesn't want to die, either.
His hands clench into fists, and puts 'em up. Ding ding! "You want to make this fast? Then come on!"
no subject
She's either ignoring the discomfort of the tohers or doesn't see it. She hooks her hands into claws and then she lungs at Beck, using one of the tumbled tables as a springboard to launch herself at him, trying to sink her claws into his shoulders and get a grip on him. She wants to grapple and bring him down where the others can get at him. So he won't run and dodge and make this difficult.
No, she wants this to be easy. Easy and oh-so-enjoyable.
no subject
It's not much. From the look in Dinner's face, he can tell the guy'll go down swinging if it's the last thing he does. Maybe he's a fighter. Was a fighter, because there's only one way this will end. Dinner's already the past tense, he just doesn't know it yet.
R gives a surprised flinch of his shoulders when Karis goes from zero to a full-on charge before he's anywhere close to ready. He's used to a lunging lurch, ambushes, overwhelming numbers, humans making dumb mistakes because they're scared. Not a Dead like Karis vaulting over tables like it's no big deal. R snaps his mouth shut, exchanges dead-eyed looks with Air, and starts shuffling after Karis almost reluctantly. He shoulders his way through one of the chairs instead of going around, shoving it aside hard as he comes at Dinner from the side, his arm reaching up to grab at anything and everything that might flail his way.
"Guh!" R growls, dripping black ooze. His mouth hangs open, lips mottled, his tongue dark and swollen as he snaps his teeth at Dinner.
no subject
His lips draw back into a feral snarl. It looks creepily natural on his face; it was once an expression he wore when on the hunt for criminals on the run, for vagrants and escapees and fugitives. He doesn't know that, of course, but he feels that the muscles move naturally into that position, easier than into other formations.
He grabs for Beck's wrists.
no subject
Maybe he wasn't trained to take on three users, but he was trained to take on multiple programs at once. He's taken down five or six guards at a time with more than enough energy to spare. If he could do that, then he can definitely take on a yellow-eyed user and two corrupted users, right? Right.
He takes a step backwards as Karis moves towards him first with no time to spare. And when he calculates the last possible moment, he takes a step to the side, allowing the user to land beside him. Beck grabs her arm to toss her to the side, letting out a small kind of gasp as he feels something sharp pricking into his arm, down into his user skin. But he ignores it all he can, throwing her out of the way for now.
The sound of something crashing against the ground draws his attention back from her, and Beck finds himself face-to-face with the same user from the Astro ride. The same one that he thought needed help. The same one that ended up cracking his disc. Ooh yeah, he remembers this user all right.
Beck was dragged to the side as the corrupt user ended up snagging his arm, and tugged- hard. He wrinkled his nose as black goop went flying everywhere, and the sharp snapping of teeth could be heard. Beck yanked his wrist back to him, and twisted his hips to the side, raising his leg up for a kick that hit the thing straight in the chest.
Then the third user came from the other side, grabbing his arm and twisting it to the side. Beck cries out as the movement causes pressure on his joints, and for a single moment, he faltered. But as quickly as he did, Beck recovered, pushing himself backwards and into the other body, aiming to smash it into the wall nearby.
no subject
Get him down. Grapple him. Let the teeth and claws do the rest.
no subject
He's seconds away from getting a bite in when he gets a mule kick to the chest. R staggers back, of course trips against the same overturned chair he shoved out of the way earlier and that does it, his sense of balance flies out the window. R goes down in a heap as the other zombies close in. Trying to scramble back to his feet, he looks up in time to see Karis trying to swing around Dinner's neck. Dinner isn't helping things by looking so amazingly Alive right now, eyes dilated in the dark, breathing heavy, moving so fast and fluid that R decides he wants to bite into those muscles and tendons and leech everything out of him.
Not that's how it goes. Not really. The hunger likes to daydream though.
R pushes himself to his feet and lurches back into the fray with a gurgle of his own. More black fluid's been kicked up, the sludge oozing down his chin as he closes, shoulder down like a drunk linebacker player. This time he shakes it up by lunging for the man's leg, trying to grab on there, throw his weight against his. Slow him down, mostly.
This is part where he should use common sense. R can't help himself - he immediately starts trying to bite through the pants into the man's thigh, holding on with a death grip, dripping black drool even though it's rude to eat with your mouth open.
no subject
He lunges forward again, faster not because of any better coordination but merely because he falls as much as steps forward at Beck. He grabs for Beck's wrist again, and then makes a move based on some instinct that is new to him, as of today. He tries to bite out the tendon in Beck's arm, at the elbow. Blunt human teeth or not, they'll do a lot of damage applied to this tender area and with the full force of jaw muscles.
GOD this is long i'm really sorry
The one with yellow eyes comes toward him again. Beck just manages to free himself from the old User's grip when he feels something wrap itself tightly around this throat. There's a rather unpleasant twinging feeling in the front of his neck, and he feels his body tense at the sudden movement. But when his body demands to draw in a breath...he can't. Beck makes a surprised choking kind of sound, staggering to the side as her weight throws him right off balance. His body tries a second time, and has the same results. His movements grow more frantic, and something inside of him starts to burn.
Beck grits his teeth and strikes out with his elbow, aiming to hit at least something, before another body comes flying straight into him. He grunts as the impact sends him stumbling a the second time, and the worst thing happens then- he falls right to his knees.
This is where the panic starts to kick in.
He looks down to the User that had tackled him, and is horrified by what he sees. Sure, it had been a little bit of a shock to see such a gruesome sight at the Blasters, but now? There's black stuff leaking out his mouth and going everywhere, and there's some kind of gray, emptiness in its eyes. The same kind of emptiness he had seen in Cutler after his reprogramming...
Beck struggles to find his footing, but that's when he feels it. A sharp, stinging twinge in his leg that only grows worse with every milicycle. He doesn't even see the third User coming towards him as he tries to get up a third time, and fails. There's too much going on. He can't straighten up, he can't breathe...he can't even see right. His heart is pounding away in his chest, and every muscle in his body aches and strains as he fights to regain himself.
He raises an arm, preparing to bash his elbow right into the drooling User's head. He doesn't want to, but-
And that's when he feels something grab right for his arm...and the second bite. It's a small kind of pain that quickly turns into a flaring agony, enough to leave his arm entirely numb. Beck lets out a strangled yell as he feels the teeth cutting into flesh, into something deeper and boarder and completely unknown to him.
These can't be normal Users. This can't end this way. Beck won't let it.
He won't
He's tired, and he's in pain, and his thoughts are moving at a million cycles an hour, but he battles to straighten himself up against the group, lashing out with whatever limbs he can still feel, with whatever strength he has left....
no subject
Karis feels the breather lash out with his limbs and she recognizes panic and desperation as the movements get a bit more convulsive and the body and mind fight to stay alive. It gives her a perverse sense of satisfaction to see it (feel it) happen and for just a fraction of a moment, she eases the chokehold she has on him so she can croon against his ear (almost like it's some twisted form of comfort), "I told you it would hurt."
Then she sinks the claws of her free hand into the wrist of his free arm and squeezes as blood starts to well to the surface and gives the arm a twist and a yank to the side. Her mouth opens wide and she bites at the curve where his shoulder meets his throat with sharp, jagged teeth.
no subject
This is it. The guy’s screwed and they all know it. Who’s he kidding? Grabbing back onto his leg, R looks up, sees Karis sinking her pointy teeth into the side of the man’s neck, Air attached to his elbow like it’s going out of style. Blood starts splattering. Some of it nails R, the zombie not even blinking as the warmth splatters across his face. His tongue flicks out to lick some of it away and if there was anything holding him back, like the little thing called a conscience that didn’t die with the rest of him? Yeah, that’s gone now. He’s swept up in the feeding frenzy with the others.
R sinks his teeth into Dinner’s thigh, rips out a big chunk, swallows it whole, and dives in for more, gnawing his way deeper and deeper with a gurgle bubbling up from his chest. The femoral artery, femur bone; it doesn’t matter, R goes for broke now. More blood fills the air with its coppery tang. R has no idea if he hit the artery as he worries at the man’s leg like an animal. Probably, because suddenly he’s getting a lot more blood going in his face and maybe it’s for the best if he gets an artery.
Dying by zombie dogpile isn’t something to drag out.
no subject
A splatter of blood from Beck's thigh splashes in Javert's face. It's blinding, in more ways than one. The hunger is like a swift current, pulling him under until his thoughts are blocked out by nothing but the need to feed. The chunk of flesh wriggling down his throat now is not satisfying. He must have more.
He sinks his teeth again into Beck's side.
no subject
...But as a User, it hurts so much more.
He only understands the functions of a User body a little- there's a skeleton that helps him to move his arms and legs. There are things inside to help his skeleton, and more things to help those things. And more things to help those things, and the other things. There more, oh so much more involved in the body of a User, other than programming and circuitry. The strange Users now are stripping away these things. And Beck can feel it. Bit by bit.
There's a moment where Beck's able to take a very quick breath, and it leads him to believing that he may have a chance. But the little bubble of hope only lasts for a moment- he hears a whisper, something about hurting. 'I.....told...........you hu...rt......'
Beck felt something sharp jab into his wrist. He wanted to gasp, to try and break away...but his breathing didn't work again. He could feel himself waver in the one User's grip as his world started to spin, taking sickening lurches to the left and the right. So he tried to move, kicking out wherever he could to hit whatever was there, and a couple of things happened at once, then. There was a hot, horrible, burning pain that spread throughout his entire arm, and then, an equal feeling right at the base of his neck. Only this one didn't feeling like burning. No, burning couldn't describe this. It was piercing. Stabbing. Unbearable.
Then came a third source, right at his thigh. Beck could feel a piece of him being literally stripped away. Clothes followed skin, skin followed muscle, muscle followed tendons. Every nerve ending was absolutely screaming.....or was that him? Was he screaming, too? He could hear something, like a high pitched wail, but it was difficult. Whatever he had been able to hear before was being replaced by a weird ringing kind of sound. A small little ring turned into an overwhelming noise, which turned into a roar. It grew louder and louder, and he wanted it to stop. Beck wanted all of it to just stop, please...
His vision was growing darker and darker, but he could still feel another set of teeth latch onto his side, stripping more pieces of his User body apart. There was nothing he could do now- he couldn't feel his arms, or his legs. He couldn't hear anything but this horrible roaring noise, and his vision had been reduced to a layer of black. Beck could just taste a weird kind of coppery flavor in the back of his mouth....and he could feel pain. Everywhere.
The pain grew too quickly for him to even know what hit him. It grew and grew to the point where it was absolutely unbearable. Tron. Where was Tron? Where was...-
It was growing better now. The pain reached its peak, to the point where he was numb. Beck twitched as his User body struggled to take in its dying breath, and then he felt....nothing.
no subject
Time to eat.
no subject
The man finally dies, his body giving a few convulsive spasms as the three zombies hold him down and then he just kinda flops over, goes limp the same way R's seen hundreds of times right before a feeding frenzy. He's still warm as he is eased to the ground. If R closes his eyes he can pretend the man's just taking a breather and it's not like they'd murdered a total stranger. He can pretend all he wants. It doesn’t change the fact that they wiped out whoever was in there and if that’s not murder, R doesn’t know what is.
The squishing sounds from Karis make R's eyes flare open. She's already covered in gore, fresh blood coating those fangs of hers, glistening red. It's hard to read her expression when she doesn't have eyes like Air and him but he thinks she’s in heaven, or the next closest thing for zombies. Suddenly she isn’t trash-talking their victim: she’s too busy.
R releases the thigh he’d been burying his face into, a string of meat dribbling out of his mouth, and crawls over to the man's head, bumping into Air on the way. The dead man’s eyes are frozen wide open. R imagines he's staring right at him, accusing, asking why the hell he got the short straw. It’s stupid. He knows there’s no one there now. He still looks away. R positions himself at the man’s shoulders and starts clumsily clawing away his head, trying to rip through his hair and get past his skull and grunting as he works. It’d be easier if he had can-openers for hands like Karis. Since he doesn’t, he needs a few minutes to get to the good stuff inside, his fingers pawing into the exposed brain and pulling out a chunk by the handful.
Finally. R’s eye rolls up as he shovels it into his mouth. He heaves a sigh, waiting -
Colors. That’s the first thing he sees, these bright neon colors flashing by that puts Vegas to shame, a shade of blue that -
R chews away.
- he glances away from the light cycle. White armor, smooth plates, programs blurring by. A disc glowing in his hand. He won’t derez, he -
R sits where he’s hunched over by the man’s shattered head, lost in his own little world and he’ll say right now, these are the trippiest memories he’s ever stolen.