Player Plot: No Bananas On The Moon

[im_pancake]

Who: Twilight Sparkle and those who expressed interest in going
What: After months of waiting, it's time to investigate what's on the Lunar Base!
Where: Starting on the Lunar Gate and continuing into the Lunar Base
When: forward-dated to 11/23
Warnings: None just yet.

It was finally time. After months of working, delays, in-fighting and all of that wonderful stuff, it was time to investigate the Lunar Base. To be quite fair, if anyone was excited for this, Twilight was. After gathering another group to join her, they all gathered at the Lunar Gate back in the Continent of Ruin. Alongside Twilight's other equipment, she sported a large airhorn. She was going to put some Heroes in their place with them.

"Alright, everyone, it's time we finally figure out what's up on the Moon." Twilight said. "I'm going to admit, I'm very excited for this - I've never been in space before." She let out a sigh. "I do want to put down one little bit of ground rule here: no fighting. We've spent so much time fighting with each other that it's time we put a stop to it. Unless you have a very good reason to object to something happening, I suggest not trying anything. We don't know what we're going to encounter up there and having a crisis of conscience if something needs to happen is something we don't need. Especially since it's space."

Straightening herself up, she smiled at the others. "Now, you guys ready to get going?"

Comments

[im_pancake]

"Honestly, I would really like it if there were notes of that sort around." Twilight said. "It's getting really ridiculous over the collection of stuff left to us and nothing saying how they work."

She chuckled at Santa's suggestion. "That would be actually pretty neat, but I don't think this place has any--"

She's cut off as Ales' work finally pays off, bringing light and power throughout the station...

...and sirens go off as red lights start to flash.

"WARNING! WARNING! T-10 MINUTES UNTIL WEAPON DISCHARGE! TARGET: CRYSTALLIS!"

And at that point, if anyone can look out the window, they can find a laser superweapon nearby, aimed at the planet. And it is charging its laser.

"...If we didn't have these problems before, I'd be more surprised..."

[scriptrix]

"Uh... Ales? Tell me we can shut that off!"

Levy darts over to where the Teensie has been working at the computer, looking around for anything like a user's manual.

[21stcenturyguy]

Wait, a countdown until certain impending doom? They're getting to familiar territory now. Santa grins.

"Everyone, look around for clues or pages of instructions. They're gotta be some trick for shutting it off."

Good thing he's not near the window, otherwise he'd get hella distracted by the laser outside.

"How about power cords? Are there plugs we can pull on that?"

[umslay]

"...Really." Ales' flat voice is barely heard over the alarm. He wasn't sure whether the threat of explosions or Santa's casual attitude was more annoying.

"I'm going to see if I can shut off this program. Hang on." His eyes focus on the holographic screen, searching through command lines for the code that fires the laser. If he can cancel that or rewrite the code to shut it off, they can still restore power to the facility.

The glare of the light on his space suit helmet obscured most of his face, which was for the better considering how fast his heart is pounding. He knows he's capable. He can do this. Just...he doesn't want to blow up again. Especially since there's no way he'll be able to come back one more time.

[im_pancake]

Despite everyone thinking they can stop it here, they're not going to find anything in Power Room. Wherever the controls are to that superweapon, it's not in this room.

Ales will, though, find out that it's in the Control Room. And with the teleporters active, they can get there faster.

[ninjainviolet]

Sheena turned to the pony and gave a wry chuckle. "If this happened before, at least we know why they didn't leave any notes." Too busy panicking.

At Santa's suggestion, the ninja began a methodical search, starting from the back of the machine and running her hand slowly along the wall.

"I'm not finding anything yet. Anyone else?"

[wickedone]

And Albel had just managed to get a suit over his gauntlet without it tearing. The rest of it, of course, was a bit over-sized to compensate, but he wasn't about to take the armor off.

He grumbled, walking in on the others searching for a way to disarm the laser. "This is not what I meant when I wished it was more interesting here." He gestured toward Ales, recognizing his screen. "Do you see anything?

[umslay]

The screen scrolls downward, Ales' eyes flicking over the symbols. Commands to turn on the laser lead to functions dictating the trigger, leading to strings of numbers and characters. A quick review shows that they correspond to servers, fortunately named after their location.

He bites his lip until he reaches the final destination of his network map reading.

"The Command Center! The trigger to shut it off is in there!" He turns to the other Heroes in the room.

[im_pancake]

"Other tunnel! Now!" Twilight said, pointing to the only other tunnel she sees outside the one that lead them there. Thankfully, this leads them to the Control Room.

Inside, there's something here that might be recognizable to some: weapons belonging to other heroes scattered across the area where they laid during a recent cycle. They've been untouched since they were last used that day.

Though, people might want to focus on the weapon as...

"WARNING! PLANETARY DESTRUCTION IN T-MINUS EIGHT MINUTES THIRTY SECONDS!"

There's various computers around, complicated for the more simple people, but someone like Ales might be able to work it easily and find the weapon systems.

[21stcenturyguy]

Santa's pretty fast, even in the space suit, so it doesn't take him long to cross the tunnel and get to the Control Room. He keeps the computer open for somebody more qualified to get to.

"If you can't stop it in time, we can use these weapons and wreck the console." It's a last-ditch effort, but if the hacking doesn't work and the weapon's gonna blow up the world anyway, they might as well try.

[ninjainviolet]

Sheena's almost right behind him, her eyes narrowing as she scans the room. Using the weapons isn't a bad idea, but that may cause other problems.

"If we do that, we may not be able to get out of here," she said. "But, there may be one computer that's a little more active than the others right now. Like maybe with a warning light or message or something like that on it."

Flashing red light, anyone?

[wickedone]

"Let's go," Albel grunted, physically grabbing the most useful person in the room -- Ales. If Ales could make sense of these machines, he was everyone's best hope. So Albel hoisted the teensie up under his arm and ran through the tunnel.

While Albel usually defaulted to violence, he remembered enough of Earth's Moonbase to strongly doubt destroying a machine would help. More than likely, it would make things worse. Besides, the weapons were strewn about haphazardly, apparently unused. And Crystallis still existed. So the other Heroes must have figured out something!

"Don't break anything! Then we'll never disable it!"

[umslay]

There was little room in the spacesuit for Ales to flail around. His visor pointed downwards, giving him solely the view of the floor rushing behind him and a glimpse of Albel's feet.

When they reached the room, Ales fidgeted in an attempt to slide out of Albel's arms. He fell to the floor with a soft thump inaudible over the sound of the siren.

"Not until I say so!" Breaking computers is a viable technique, but only when all other avenues are exhausting. Plus, breaking precious technology is a sin in Ales' eyes. He ran over to the main terminal, booted up his hacking device once more, and searched through the code.

[im_pancake]

As Ales searches through the code, he'll find various things besides the means to shut down the weapon. There code connected to other super weapons on this base, enough to make a movie super villain jealous. There's also a series of notes, written in English, that seem... recentish. The last entries made on this console before it was shut off.

[umslay]

...English.

Ales takes in a deep breath and goes through the motions of shutting down this weapon. The other things look interesting, which he'll go over in detail later. Each shaky press of the button comes closer to saving their lives and prevent another Teensie death by exploding.

Once he's certain the system won't boot up again, he turns to the other Heroes.

"A little help here with translation? I found some notes in the code I can't read."

[scriptrix]

"Oh! Yeah, hang on."

Levy heads over to where Ales is perched at the console, looking over the English notes. She'll read whatever she finds there out loud for the benefit of the group.

[im_pancake]

The good news is: the weapons have been shut down! Hurrah for Ales!

The bad(?) news?: Those notes are quite interesting.

They're from someone named Blair and what they say is... interesting.

They told of a plan by the Heroes of Light of that time to use this base as a means to end the Calamity their way - by obliterating the planet by the very superweapon they just shut down. It told of her allies, ones referred to as "the Librarian"and "Ganondorf", as they sought to protect her in case someone tried to attack them.

The notes continue, mentioning that they were indeed confronted by others - "Link" "Hylia", "Sophia" and "Faize" - in their attempts to stop them. They said their parts, but it seemed that Blair was adamant in proceeding with the plan.

The last set of notes, however, told of a change of heart - the risks were too great. She couldn't go through with it. There had to be another way to stop this. She shut down the power to the base to stop anyone from using it...

And it just stops. Whatever happened in the last notes, it seems that this Blair couldn't finish typing. Had the heroes who confronted them stopped her? Who could say?

"...well...I didn't expect that bit..." Twilight uttered, still a bit shocked.

[21stcenturyguy]

Aoi whistled as Levy read the notes. He didn't know any of the people from the story, but he recognized an averted apocalypse when he saw one. That had been a close call. In parallel universes, they might have just ended everything.

"So, any chance we can turn this weapon, like, toward space or somewhere where it won't destroy the world if somebody accidentally trips the switch again? I vote for doin' that."

[ninjainviolet]

Sheena looked up from the computer she was examining when Albel came in, visibly wincing as Ales was unceremoniously dropped to the floor. Shaking her head, she stepped to the side as the Teensie hooked up to the computer, her head tilting as she watched him work.

Once he was finished, she breathed a sigh of relief. Well, that was one thing down. But now, they had something a little more interesting on their hands. And possibly the reason why Palitutu claimed they didn't have what it took to end the Calamity.

Brows furrowing, she looked in the direction they had come, an idea occurring to her.

"Think it might be possible to use this thing at a lower power level to give the First Crystal some energy?"

[umslay]

A light flickered across Ales' eyes at Ganondorf's name. He spoke to that man nearly a year ago when he arrived with the Mysidian Heroes, and the name "Link" was much more familiar. But it couldn't be the same people. It have to be--

"The last cycle. Does anyone else have memories of this place?" Following Sheena's suggested, he ran through the code once more in search of a power level adjuster parameter. If that weren't possible, he could always write the code in.

[im_pancake]

"Sadly, I don't." Twilight said. "I'm sure if those don't here, someone back home does." Ales won't find any sort of power regulator, but he can certainly create one, or even to point the stupid thing elsewhere.

Beyond the fallen weapons, there are two teleported nearby and an airlock. The portals lead to an "Eidolon Research" area, an "Proto-Eidolon Research" area and on reading as just "Danger"

[scriptrix]

Eidolon Research, Proto-Eidolon Research, and Danger.

[Levy repeats the words on the signs for the group, looking to each of the teleporters in turn.]

I've had enough danger for now, so maybe let's check out one of the research areas.

[sesenta]

Akane at last toddles up to the group in her space suit, bearing mysterious coffee stains. It's not as if she lagged behind because the spilling of her coffee just so happened to coincide with the warning lights that went off, making her think that it was all her fault somehow.

Logically that made no sense, but she only got a few sips of coffee and the coincidence was too much for her weary brain to bear. She was so tired, you guys.

Still there was nothing to get the adrenaline glands pumping like a threat of planetary destruction, so she was a little more on her game now. "'Proto' means 'original' in Latin. That might indicate that some changes were made to existing Eidolons," she theorized, growing very curious. Now she wished she'd equipped her Summoner job instead of Magitek Knight. "Shall we split up? I'd very much like to see the Proto-Eidolon research room."

[21stcenturyguy]

"I dunno, 'Danger Room' sounds kinda badass." Grumbling aside, Santa followed behind Akane. He raised an eyebrow at the coffee stains.

"Fine. Proto-Eidolon for me, too. We can learn more about Eidolons if we find out where they came from."

[umslay]

Adjusting the power parameters would take more work, as well as a return to the facility with other Hackers. For now, he turned the weapon to point a bit above the planet. If an invader came from outer space, they'd be ready to blast it into smithereens.

"Let's go from Proto-Eidolon to Eidolon. I'm not one to care about these creatures, but you might need help accessing the data."