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Cam is out flying. There's a decent cloud of atmosphere around the gold plane, now, millenia of demons making air around themselves for comfort and not sealing it up because why would you bother. There's a small forest, here - the effect is kind of ruined by the lamps it has to grow under, but it's still pretty.
He feels an open summons and lets it grab him -
from_scratch
- and appears in a circle etched into a perfectly flat nearly featureless plain extending to the horizon in every direction.
It's immediately obvious something ominous is going on; higher gravity and a thin atmosphere, for one thing. A tiny sharp sun glaring coldly on an almost black sky without much air or dust to scatter the light. There's no living thing in sight to have done the summoning, either.
Maybe it's the fact of the circle being a huge and hugely complex fractal thing both familiar and alien in an odd way that probably warrants further study, and appears to have been laser etched deep into some kind of concrete like but smoother (almost glassy) material. The lines visibly reek of magic, a half invisible turquoise flame.
Or, it might be the endless line of almost identical circles extending like crops on a field along some kind of track, and parallel more tracks flanked by circles in one direction but just the tracks in the other.
The one single feature extending more than a millimeter over the flatness is some kind off vehicle on the same track as the circle, already too far away to make out any detail of and rapidly disappearing over the horizon.
It's immediately obvious something ominous is going on; higher gravity and a thin atmosphere, for one thing. A tiny sharp sun glaring coldly on an almost black sky without much air or dust to scatter the light. There's no living thing in sight to have done the summoning, either.
Maybe it's the fact of the circle being a huge and hugely complex fractal thing both familiar and alien in an odd way that probably warrants further study, and appears to have been laser etched deep into some kind of concrete like but smoother (almost glassy) material. The lines visibly reek of magic, a half invisible turquoise flame.
Or, it might be the endless line of almost identical circles extending like crops on a field along some kind of track, and parallel more tracks flanked by circles in one direction but just the tracks in the other.
The one single feature extending more than a millimeter over the flatness is some kind off vehicle on the same track as the circle, already too far away to make out any detail of and rapidly disappearing over the horizon.
The only reply is eerie silence, not even the howling of wind or the buzzing of insects. Perfect stillness.
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Cam squints at the circle, and then shrugs and walks out of it. "Hello? Can I help somebody here?"
The outer diameter of the circle is about five meters, and it seems to be composed of several concentric layers. The extreme precision and complexity would make it's automated origins pretty obvious even lacking the also obvious environmental clues. Some symbols and patterns are clearly recognizable, or at least in line with such, but curiously other parts are obvious nonsense, and quite a few are too alien to tell. Based of the other similar circles, maybe some kind of procedural generation or genetic algorithm just stumbled upon the correct parts? Conspicuously absent is any kind of language.
As he leaves the next outermost layer, there is a very short and high pitched beep, but otherwise nothing seems to happen.
As he leaves the next outermost layer, there is a very short and high pitched beep, but otherwise nothing seems to happen.
There appears to be no possible source other than the circle itself, unless it's embedded in the ground (floor?) or something.
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Cam starts tapping the floor to see if he can determine if it's hollow or anything.
As far as he can tell, it's perfectly uniform to the core of the planet.
from_scratch
Huh.
Cam makes a little red flag to stick in his original circle in case he wants to find it again, plants it there, and goes aloft to see if there's anything else to be seen.
Cam makes a little red flag to stick in his original circle in case he wants to find it again, plants it there, and goes aloft to see if there's anything else to be seen.
As he's barely gotten of the ground, something can indeed be spotted approaching VERY rapidly. Based on the fact it's keeping to the rails, and is somewhat tall, it's probably some kind of rail cart with something on top of it.
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Cam doesn't think he wants it to run him over. He circles above it, watching it.
It's moving way too fast to circle, but slows down and stops as it approaches. It appears to be some kind of high tech rail-mounted robotic arm - no, make that golem arm, based on being made from the same material as the ground and the glowing runes covering it - and tries to grab him!
from_scratch
"Whoa, hey," says Cam, getting more altitude. "None of that, thanks."
There is a loud pang like a gunshot, and the hand is replaced by some arcane contraption of crystals and antennas, presumably by teleport. Shortly, Cam is caught in an overpowered force field bubble and reeled in, while a small and hitherto unnoticed secondary arm scans the circle with the flag.
There is no reply as the arm whizzes back the way it came at barely below the speed of sound. After maybe 15 minutes it rendezvouses with what looks like a spaceship from some very soft scifi designed by a very stubborn architect overdoing brutalism.
The light goes out for a moment, and then the bubble dissipates and drops him onto the floor of a featureless white cube of a room.
The light goes out for a moment, and then the bubble dissipates and drops him onto the floor of a featureless white cube of a room.
Nothing in particular happens.
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Cam thinks for a minute, then says, "You have until I finish my sandwich to say hello, before I start trying exotic acids and work my way up to black holes," and sits on the floor and makes himself a large sandwich and bites it.
Half a second after it appears, the sandwich disappears with another painfully loud PANG, even taking with it a painful millimeter of the fingers holding it to add injury to insult.
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"Ow," says Cam. He starts trying all the other languages he knows. "Can I just talk to somebody? Or go home, that would also be fine?" Repeat repeat repeat until he's out of languages. He didn't get any new ones with this summon, but who knows.
After a while, several ghostly glowing holograms pop up: one appears to be a scan of Cam, one a smaller version of the circle he appeared in, an entire wall is covered in varying kinds of gibberish symbols.
Another wall is covered in stuff like groups of dots each with one more and primes and fibonacci ones marked, atomic structure diagrams, and other standard attempts at establish basic concepts from nothing.
(OOC: If the surface of this wall is touched, it'll leave marks behind in the hologram, letting him draw/write, the others have other touch responses.)
Another wall is covered in stuff like groups of dots each with one more and primes and fibonacci ones marked, atomic structure diagrams, and other standard attempts at establish basic concepts from nothing.
(OOC: If the surface of this wall is touched, it'll leave marks behind in the hologram, letting him draw/write, the others have other touch responses.)
from_scratch
Cam's hand is better by now. He thinks for a moment, then conjures up a copy of his computer from home, but under every layer of encryption he's ever heard of in case it's stolen away again because they don't want him to cheat on his prime numbers test or something.
It takes them about 0.2 seconds to do that.