Phoning it in 1
I suddenly awoke to find myself lying on a dirty sofa in a back alley of a city I've never been to before. Right away I knew I was in an SI.
Let me say right up front I like reading SIs, I like writing SIs, but I hate being in an SI. To quote a midget with hairy feet, 'an adventure is someone else going through a rough time.' at least I think that's how it goes.
I mentally go over what I know. I have to survive ten years in this place and something is going to be coming after me by attacking the city in a month. I get the impression of something like Godzilla, but nothing more than that.
Well, fuck.
I'm a bit mollified when I go over my power list, as I seem to have made myself into a copy of Merlin. Not the magician, well actually he was a magician and the Merlin you are thinking of was named after him.
Let me get back on track. I have to survive ten years in a place where Godzilla is going to start hunting me down in the space of a month... and I have to be here for it. I can feel the geas placed on me.
I need time to think, a lot of time.
I hear gunshots not quite in the distance and decide to stretch my legs and gain some time. Standing up I focus on my surroundings. I'm in a back alley with a dirty sofa and a lot of trash. There is broken glass and graffiti everywhere, with swastikas featuring prominently. This is not a good neighborhood.
I check the sofa for loose change and find a little over a dollar, two disposable lighters, and a pocket knife. Better than nothing and the change looks like normal American currency so I guess I'm in America.
Taking a deep breath I take a step forward, the alley shifting around me, the graffiti changing languages. I take another step and the sofa turns into an easy chair and the graffiti is now in day-glow colors. A few more steps and the noise of the city vanishes, as does most of the trash and the graffiti, instead there is grass growing through cracks in the sidewalk.
I can feel the countdown till Godzilla attacks slow to a glacial pace, like an hourglass dropping a single grain of sand a day.
I take a deep breath as I exit the alley and find the air hotter and cleaner. I'm in an LA without a trace of smog or people. It's obvious that the city is deserted, yet the street lights are still functioning.
I need something to eat and a solid plan to avoid getting stomped on by a size twelve thousand foot, but I have time now, so most of my completely reasonable (and in no way cowardly) panic is gone.
I like this version of LA, it's one of the places I thought had the calmest apocalypse of anywhere, even Miranda. A comet passed close to the Earth and everyone had been instructed that it might cause electrical interference so all flights were grounded and all vehicles parked when it occurred.
I'm not sure why this world differed so much from most modern Earth's, especially other ones where it was sometime in the mid 80's, but something happened in World War II that caused them to be a lot more safety cautious when it came to power plants, operating machinery, and even household appliances in general.
It'd been a month since the night of the comet and yet there were no fires or floods and the streetlights were still on and the power plants humming along, despite the fact that less than a dozen people were probably still alive in the entire North American continent.
I spot a 7-11 and head for it. I'm a bit hungry and hopefully their Slurpee machine is still running. The doors open at my approach and a blast of cold air hits me. There are piles of clothes and red dust scattered about inside, unlike outdoors where wind and rain cleaned up everything. I'm tempted to snag a bit of the jewelery laying there, but there are better places for that, ones that aren't so ghoulish.
I walk out of the store with a fountain drink and a bag full of snacks not more than a minute later, the Slurpee machine was frozen solid and the rotisserie chicken and hot dogs qualified as jerky at this point. After the cool of the air conditioned store the heat seems like a bit much so I take off my jacket and hear a clinking noise.
Going through my jacket's pockets, something I should have done earlier, I discover five glowing vials. Each vial has a word written on it followed by a symbol of some sort. They read: Energy, Mass, Acceleration, Gravity, and Forethought.
They practically cry out for me to drink them, so naturally I put them away. I don't care what my instincts say, I'm not drinking a glowing vial of unknown fluid without a damn good reason!
Merlin's memories not withstanding, you'd think I'd be a lot less accepting of all of this, but I'm pretty calm. Sure I was a bit panicked by knowing Godzilla wants me dead and I'll have to face him, but even that was just a fraction of the mind numbing terror I should have felt.
Despite the fact that its been a month and all of the red dust was gone and most of the clothes had been washed or blown away, there was still a lot of shoes and jewelry lying around, in the gutters. I start collecting gold and silver chains, just for something to do as I walk along the sidewalk looking for a good hotel to stay at.
I round a corner and find myself looking at the beach. As I take in the many signs and the tropical island theme I realize I'm not in LA I'm in the Tropics. I had been aiming for LA and gotten somewhere near the Equator, no matter how you slice it my aim is lousy. Well at least I got the right world, the multiple piles of red dust that used to be people don't lie.
I walked along the beach, sipping my soda and eating junk food, those five vials clinking in my jacket pocket as I walked calling out for me to drink them and being firmly ignored. I watched the seabirds circle over the beach and wondered why only humans had been affected by the comet. Or was it only humans? Maybe it just affected large mammals. I don't know. All I really did know was that humans had all been reduced to red dust and nothing else appeared to have been touched.
I saw what looked to be a good sized black... dog? No, it's face was too flattened and its head too round. It looked a little like a Koala but its face was all wrong, having an overly large eyes and nose, and its mouth was huge for its size.
As I approached it turned its head to look at me and its eyes widened, clearly surprised. The sky clouded over quickly and it bolted, running on two legs as the sky opened up and poured warm water down on me like I was taking a shower. It was rather nice truthfully.
I followed its tracks in the sand. It was about two thirds my size but left much deeper prints. It was also dripping some kind of... ink? It was leaving a trail of black in the sand, which would have made it easy to follow even if it hadn't left deep grooves in the sand.
The sky suddenly cleared up as quickly as it had clouded over and the black mutant koala bear returned. Whatever had panicked him was gone as he looked at me in wonder and slowly reached out to poke me with a single digit to make sure I was real.
When I didn't pop or vanish he smiled. He didn't behave like an animal regardless of how he looked, so I decided to treat him like a person. I extended my hand. "Name's John, glad to meet you."
He almost reached for my hand before suddenly dropping to all fours and saying," Bark, bark."
I blinked and retracted my hand. He hadn't barked he had said the word bark. Oh well, I've met stranger. "Good boy?" I offered.
He nodded at me and said, "Woof," Seemingly satisfied with my response.
"Wanna go to the local grocery store and microwave some frozen pizzas?" I asked. He nodded rapidly. "OK, boy, lead the way."
"Bow wow," he said and waved for me to follow him before dropping on all fours and heading inland.
I followed him. If he wants to claim to be a dog, who was I to argue?
Typing by: Abyssal Angel
Worm CYOA Setup!
Difficulty: Standard - 6 free points (4) Copy Character Sheet - Merlin son of Corwin chosen. 13 total - 6 for Standard 7 points of disadvantages needed. (-1) Pint Sized - young (10-11) 7 points
Type: Self Insert
(2) Power Manipulation - Muahahaha!
(1) Blank - Seers can not see you!
(1) Shattered Limiter - Powers grow stronger with time.
(1) Special Snowflake - Powers can't be hacked.
(1) Cauldron Vials - 5 labeled top tier power vials.
(1) Libromancer - Ever get lost in a book?
(1) For Want of a nail - Scion has left the building.
(1) Inviticus - Untouchable mind.
(-1) Leviathan - 1 month countdown
(-2) Welcome to The Slaughterhouse - New toy spotted.
(-2) Wildbow? What's a Wildbow? - No knowledge of setting
(-1) Geas - Welcome to the party - Must show up for Leviathan