Bullet in the brainpan.

>>37384403
>No checking, just move. You can make it 15 clicks, at least, before nightfall.

If they shot down the schooner presumably they're on their way here now to eat.

Also, OP you might not want to put a "kill yourself" option in the first post unless you really want your thread to go to pieces.

>>37384403
>Check the wrecked schooner for salvage and supplies before doing anything else

>>37384403
>No checking, just move. You can make it 15 clicks, at least, before nightfall.

>>37384403
>Check the wrecked schooner for salvage and supplies before doing anything else.

Damn thats the 4th quest dead today.

>>37384901
It's only been a half hour.

>>37384403
salvage for survival!

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>No checking, just move.

You haul your ass out of there as soon as the shell shock wears off, taking nothing but your gun and your canteen with you. And your rebreather, of course, but that never left your face. One of the other things the priests taught you as boy, never breath the air outside the city's walls. It does something to a man, to a woman, that breaks down everything noble and good inside them and makes them blood thirsty. Only a Pavlov Collar can overcome that darkness, and those just break them entirely till the men nothing but proles to work and the women are nothing but wombs to fuck.

Once you're near a hundred meters out - north-north east, a beeline to Neo Kyoto - you duck behind a dune and look back.

You sorely wish you hadn't.

The wind that sweeps this gods forsaken wasteland blew your tracks into dust as sure as the sky is grey, which helps your calm a bit. But just as surely, the sight of the wrecked schooner hurts it. A dozen savages naked to the blistering, sandy wind dance among the ruins, gnawing at the limbs of your old crew. You turn away, but their howls continue, haunting you even as you steel your resolve. Forward's the only direct to go, so forward's where your feet will take you.

A thankful pray goes up to whatever saint built the compass that you're own is descended from. The little arrow, always in the corner of your vision, keeps you straight and on track even as the wind begins to worsen, and kick up clouds of dust and sand. The clock right above it lets you know how long you've marched, even as you zone out to mindlessly put one foot infront of the other.

Time slips by, and just as dusk sets you see an oasis.

A patch of shrubs and trees, and where there's plant life, there's water. Possibly untainted water, free of the nanoplagues the ancients unleashed in their wrath.

Rolled 46 (1d100)

>hide under pile of corpses and schooner bits, prepare for cannibals. Set traps if possible. gotta replace those marks or the emperor's men will castrate you.

>>37384742
this

>>37385025

>Approach the Oasis cautiously; you're canteen is almost out, you'll need to refill it.
>Scout the Oasis before approaching, from all sides. Can't be too careful.
>Ignore the Oasis, and continue your treck. You'll wait for rainfall, rather than risk the gray death.
>Bullet in the brain-pan, squish.
>[Write In]

>>37385025
>Scout the Oasis before approaching, from all sides. Can't be too careful.

>>37385047
>>Scout the Oasis before approaching, from all sides. Can't be too careful.

>>37385047
>>Approach the Oasis cautiously; you're canteen is almost out, you'll need to refill it.

>>37385047
>Approach the Oasis cautiously; you're canteen is almost out, you'll need to refill it.

>Scout the Oasis before approaching, from all sides. Can't be too careful.

>>37385025
>>37385047

>Scout the Oasis before approaching, from all sides. Can't be too careful.

>>37385047
>Scout the Oasis before approaching, from all sides. Can't be too careful.

>15 clicks
This should be covered easily by someone trained.
>desert, nanoplagues
I read shit for the weirdest reasons

god i hope this quest dies.

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>Scout it out.

You drop the moment you see the palm trees sprouting out between the dunes. The odds of any savage being able to see you at this distance are slim, but enough of your caste have gone mad in the desert to warrant caution. Their eyes could be like your eyes, blessed by the priests and sacred technists to see with sight beyond even that of the soldier caste. With but a thought, you sight becomes like the falcons, as you see the oasis as if you were right upon it.

Empty, from this angle. But the shrubs and the trees give cover to the water, where the savages might gather with their slavering beasts to drink their fill before another raid. You skirt along the edges of dunes, circling the oasis in search of a sign of taint, or the smoke of a savage tribe. Shrubs and bushes, and a few prey animals of the desert come to congregate, those are all you can see as you circle about from the six and the nine.

You spot a savage once you reach the twelve.

A woman, and a girl. The women is near as nubile as the slavemeat you lost on your schooner, but you can see the mark of a plague upon her, how she hasn't been eaten by the other savages. The mark of peace, etched in black on the skin of her navel, a nanoplague most insidious. It breaks its victims more thoroughly than even the Pavlov Collar, leaving them naught but passive husks to be eaten, or used as broodmares for those tribes with some remnant of cunning.

The girl is an anomaly. Only slightly older than you were when taken by the Priests to be marked as a slaver, she almost looks civilized. To start, she isn't prancing about the desert in the nude looking to rape, murder, and eat everything she comes across - she is simply attending the woman. More to the point she's not prancing about the desert nude; she's dressed in a coverall made of a hardy fabric. Perhaps she's a survivor, of a plight similar to your own?

>Go into the Oasis and greet the girl.
>Ignore the Oasis, it has nothing useful for you.

>>37385675
Stop posting in it then retard. Leave us in peace.

>>37385734
>Go into the Oasis and greet the girl.
We need the water if nothing else.

>>37385734
>Go into the Oasis and greet the girl.

>>37385734
>Go into the Oasis and greet the girl.

>>37385734
>Try to ambush and overpower her. This is something to learn about.

>>37385734
>>Go into the Oasis and greet the girl.

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>Meet and greet.

You opt to unholster your gun, just to be on the safe side. The wastes have been known to produce all manner of mutant and monster in the guise of a man, between the radiation and the swarming tides of gray goo. Better to be safe than sorry, especially if this one simply lays in wait, using the beauty of the infected woman to draw in her prey. That's what you would do, at least, if you were a psychotic cannibal mutant living in the wide empty spaces between civilization. You've given it a lot of thought, considering that it might well be your retirement plan.

Wordlessly and noiselessly, you slide over the banks of sand that sit between you and the oasis, being careful to keep your profile as small as you are able. This becomes markedly harder once you reach the shrubs and trees, as plants like to announce the presence of anyone careless enough to step on them. But you manage to get close enough to the girl without her giving any sign that she noticed you. You keep your gun aimed to the ground as you approach her; you know from experience how bad a first impression holding a gun to someone's face can make.

"Are you alright, miss?" you ask the girl.

The girl almost jumps out of her pretty pink jumpsuit, throwing herself to the ground and rolling away from you. You feel a streak of heat zip by you, and see a bright white line of plasma arc miss both you and the woman by inches. The girl's on one knee now, one of those little rayguns barely useful for starting a fire in her hands, staring at you with wide open eyes. To her credit, she does not squeak in shock at seeing someone who isn't a cannibal getting the drop on her. She lowers the nozzle of her gun.

The woman, of course, does nothing but stare off into space.

>>37386218

"Gee willickers, mister," she says. You're not familiar with the phrase, but at least you can tell that she's speaking English, not Japanese. "I'm sorry 'bout that. Papa told me not to shoot anyone with a mask on out here, 'cuz that's a rebreather, right?"

>Well, I'm not on fire, so there's no harm done. You alright?
>Yes it is. I take it you know what happens to people who don't?
>What's an American doing all the way out in the Korea-Japan sandsea?
>Bullet in both your brain-pans, squish.
>[Write in]

>>37386218
>What's an American doing all the way out in the Korea-Japan sandsea?
>Yes it is. I take it you know what happens to people who don't?

>>37386242
>Yes it is. I take it you know what happens to people who don't?
>What's an American doing all the way out in the Korea-Japan sandsea?

>>37386242
>>Yes it is. I take it you know what happens to people who don't?

>>37386242
>Yes it is. I take it you know what happens to people who don't?
>What's an American doing all the way out in the Korea-Japan sandsea?

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>Point out American kids don't usually come around these parts.
>Point out that she'll probably turn into a cannibal soon.

"We don't get many foreigners touring the desert," you deadpan at the girl. "What brings someone from so far in the east to this gods forsaken place?"

The girl gets up, brushing the sand off of her bright pink jumpsuit, almost completely oblivious to the question that you asked. She stretches herself out for a bit, and you cannot help but be reminded of the cats blessed by the priests and sacred technists with a connection to the Diviner's Will. Or any cat, for that matter. When you stare at her expectantly, she returns the look with big blue doe eyes that remind you of the look this one savage girl had when you slapped a Pavlov Collar on her. Couldn't have been more than eleven or twelve, and the innocence in her eyes melted away into savage hunger right before the collar kicked in.

"Oh!" the girl exclaims, not screaming in agony as the nonexistant collar flooded her neurons with electricity. "Um, well, you see this information is classified and may only be released to personnel with an authorization of Zeta Delta Black. So we decided to this information is classified and may only be released to personnel with an authorization of Zeta Delta White or higher. But then, WHOOSH, the engine exploded and we spun out. Papa said he was going to sleep, but I'm pretty sure the support beam in his gut killed him, and that's when he gave me the gun and told me to shoot anyone without a mask on."

Half the girl's words sound like white noise. That's another thing you learned about back in the temple - anyone whose voice is blessed by the angels that dangerous truths may not spill from their lips should be brought to the Temple. Which means this girl is probably some holy figure to the Americans, and the fact that she doesn't have a rebreather on is very, very bad.

>>37386864
"I take it you know what happens to people without a rebreather?" you ask giving the girl a meaningful look.

She takes a few seconds to catch on, slinging the raygun over her shoulder. You continue staring at her for a good minute, as she goes back to her business of cleaning the Pax infected woman. The girl begins humming a merry tune, some children's hymn you recall from your youth about the collapse of a bridge in London. Rather morbid, from a girl as sunny as her.

"Oh!" she chirps when she catches you eye, finally understanding it. "Don't worry about me, I'm a priestess. The High Priest had us blessed when we took our vows, that we make speak the sacred words unhindered even by the foulest taint of the World Outside. See, right here!"

She raises up her chin, rubbing a patch of silver embedded into her skin that traces right down the neck, into her coverall. You give a grunt of acceptance, silently jealous of how the Sacred Caste receives all of the best blessings. It's only right, though, they are the speakers for the gods.

>Acknowledge her explanation and roll out with her. There's still a hair of daylight to kill.
>Set up camp here in the Oasis. The priestess might be able to cleanse the water, and the brush provides more cover than a dune.
>Leave her and the woman here, and high tail it if the girl doesn't follow you.
>Bullet in every brain-pan, squish!
>[Write In]

>>37386882
>Set up camp here in the Oasis. The priestess might be able to cleanse the water, and the brush provides more cover than a dune

Huh. Where'd everyone go?

>>37387028
To bed, most likely. I got a rather later start to the quest than I would have wanted.

I'll probably be hitting the hay soon too. This'll continue in the morning, if the thread's still around.

>>37387072
I'll keep it bumped for a while then. Thanks for running.

Do you have a twitter account?

>>37387101
No. I'll see about getting one if its the done thing.

>>37387149
It's what most people do. It's just a good way to let people know you're running or that you need to cancel a session or whatever.

>>37386882
>>Acknowledge her explanation and roll out with her. There's still a hair of daylight to kill.

Bump

A short but pleasant read so far. Looking forward to the continuation.

>Set up camp here in the Oasis. The priestess might be able to cleanse the water, and the brush provides more cover than a dune.

>>37386882
>>Set up camp here in the Oasis. The priestess might be able to cleanse the water, and the brush provides more cover than a dune


also, what's up with all the murder-suicide options?

Bump

>>37389972
agree.. you know that is a good troll bate

Those savages arnt far off, maybe dont stick around long enough for them to return?

And just share your own tale of misfortune with her as well

Bump

Last bump from me.

bump you bumper

>bumping edgelord, the questening

Oh well, I'm no saint in that regard.