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(-0)Article: Rapture (alternate title: "This Tale Made Fullham Cry Like a Bitch, See How You Stack Up (You Will Likely Win Because He Is An Emotionally Frail Manchild)")
Author:
BattleblockB0ss
Critters:
Doctor Fullham,
Zoobeeny,
StrangerSwing,
Agente Shuffle,
Meserach,
GlassAutomaton
Image Credits:
Top TMO Bar, by
Bottom TMO Bar, by
Wandsmen Logo, byVivarium, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0
CW: Descriptions of violence, gore, and panic attacks
Mina was having an awful morning. After a particularly bad fight with her girlfriend, Mina had spent the night tossing and turning on the couch. As she took a sip of her coffee in a doomed attempt to revitalize her exhausted mind she mulled over what had happened. After yet another late workday filling out forms and reviewing security footage, Mina arrived home an hour later than usual. Tambry confronted her as soon as she walked in the door, asking- yet again- what she did at work every day. Tired and snappish from poring over computer screens all day, Mina tried to make her understand - again - why she couldn't talk about her job.
"I just don't fucking understand how you can leave the house every morning at 5 A.M, come home late every other day, and tell me nothing about what you're up to all day. Fuck, we've been together for 2 YEARS and I still don't have the faintest fucking idea what your job is."
"Tambry, we've talked about this over and over. I can't talk about what I do. I signed an NDA. If I told you even the most basic details about my job they'd fire me, and then where would we be?"
"How the fuck would they know? Who the fuck IS 'they?' I'm your girlfriend, you can trust me with anything!"
"They have ways of knowing. I'm sorry, okay? You have no idea how fucking bad I want to tell you everything that happens to me every day. But I can't. I don't- how can I make you understand this?"
"'They have ways of knowing?' What the fuck does that even mean? Jesus, Mina, you sound fucking paranoid. Who do you work for, the CIA? The KGB?"
"Close enough."
After another half hour of fighting, Tambry stormed off to their room and locked the door, leaving Mina to cry herself to a fitful sleep. When she woke up, the door was still locked, leaving Mina no option but to leave for work without a shower or change of clothes. If that wasn't enough, another round of layoffs had left the Site-14 security force short-staffed, sticking Mina on desk duty with fucking Jerry for the next 9 hours. Sighing, Mina checked her watch. 8 hours and 14 minutes, to be exact.
"Have you seen the newest Cheers episode?" Jerry blurted at her. "It's classic. You won't believe what Sam did…"
Mina shut her eyes and did her best to shut out Jerry's droning. Just 8 hours and 13 minutes left. Then she'd get to go home and spend time with Tambry- assuming she's cooled down by then. Mina groaned as she put her head in her hands, reliving the fight yet again. This job. It's always this fucking job. She missed her best friend's wedding for this job, she missed her niece's first birthday for this job, and now her relationship's falling apart. Why? For this fucking job. Jerry's constant blathering certainly didn't help either.
"Heyo, you still there Minana?" Jerry tapped her on the shoulder, startling her out of her brooding. Mina jumped, spilling her steaming coffee all over the front of her shirt.
"Jesus, Jerry! What the fuck?" Mina snapped at him. Jerry jumped back sheepishly. He opened his mouth to speak, but Mina cut him off before he could. "Ow, fuck. I'm going to the bathroom to try to clean this up. Don't fuck anything up while I'm gone." Mina walked out of the security booth in the direction of the bathrooms- the only working bathrooms on-site, to be specific. The ones adjacent to the security office had been out of commission for weeks. Why? "Budget cuts".
After sopping up the brown mess dripping down her shirt, Mina headed back through the winding hallways of Site-14 to the front desk. During the long commute to and from the bathroom, she'd had time to cool down. Jerry wasn't that bad, he just didn't know how to read people's moods, and Mina was not in a good one after the fight with Tambry.
On the topic of Tambry, Mina was starting to realize that she couldn't stay at this job and sustain her relationship at the same time. Tambry was right, this whole thing was unfair to both of them. Mina hated her job as well as the secrecy and dedication that came with it- she had never wanted to work in security, she wanted to be a police officer and make a difference. Plus, Tambry deserved to know what her girlfriend did at work and why she was home late so often.
Mina resolved to sit down with Tambry and talk about it as soon as she got home. She was composing an apology for snapping at Jerry when she heard a crash. Thinking Jerry probably dropped something, Mina's bad mood rekindled as she swore under her breath, slowing her steps so she wouldn't have to help clean it up. However, she soon realized something was wrong. The crashing sounds were getting louder and more violent.
"He- hey! Stop right there! I have a gu- holy shit, what- what the fuck are you? Stand back-" Several gunshots rang out. "I said stand b-" Jerry's terrified voice gave way to screaming, and after a few seconds, silence. The crashing continued further into the building, growing quieter. More screams started up in the distance.
Frozen in place, Mina snapped back to herself. She sprinted down the corridor, thoughts crashing around her head. What just happened? What could have made those noises? As Mina rounded the corner to the lobby, she froze yet again.
The room looked like the aftermath of a tornado. The chairs were flung everywhere, some splintered to pieces. The security desk was on its side and was partially embedded in a wall. And Jerry- oh god, Jerry. There was a nauseatingly large- and quickly growing- pool of blood emanating from him. His empty, bloody gun sat on the ground several feet away from him. But worst of all was his body.
Jerry was lying on his back in the corner of the room. It looked like a massive eagle had taken its claws to his stomach. His limbs were intact, but his bowels were ripped out of his chest, and he was gasping for breath as blood leaked from the side of his mouth. Mina rushed to his side, stammering. "I- wha- what did- Jerry- I'm sorry- I'm so sorry- what-" Jerry made a gurgling noise as he coughed out more blood, looked her in the eyes, and went limp. Hyperventilating, she stood up and stumbled backward into the wall, sobbing.
Mina spared one more glimpse at Jerry's mangled body, trying to process what had just happened. She didn't know what could have done this, but she did know she had to stay as far away from it as possible. Screams still sounding in the distance, Mina turned and ran home.
USA, Florida - 911 call
Language: English
Key words: smoke, fifth
Operative to evaluate
"…yeah, there's smoke coming from the wooded area behind my house. This is the fifth time it's happened since we moved here." NEGATIVE.
Antonio clicked through his 34th call of the day so far. He leaned back, stretching his arms as his joints popped: he wasn't used to sitting in a chair for so long yet. It had only been a week since he'd started working for the Foundation- more specifically, the Telecommunications Monitoring Office- and Antonio found it excruciatingly dull. He didn't realize his fancy title just meant he'd be listening to stoners ramble about their hallucinations all day. He'd had enough of stoners lately, thanks to his former roommate Rodrick.
There was nothing wrong with Rodrick, really. He was a good guy. Living with him was just too much for Antonio: he never cleaned, he played his electric guitar at all hours, the smell of weed was ingrained in every surface, and he constantly invited his band over to practice. The breaking point was when he'd spray-painted his band's logo on their living room wall.
After Antonio moved out, he was able to secure a tiny apartment in a decent area for an affordable price. However, now that he wasn't sharing the rent with Rodrick, Antonio couldn't afford to stay on at his minimum-wage Walmart job. So after he got home one night, he pulled out his laptop and started looking for jobs. He stumbled upon an ad that said "TELEPHONE OPERATORS REQUIRED. FLEXIBLE HOURS, DAY OR NIGHT. DISCRETION REQUIRED." After going through a bizarre application process, he found himself at Site-14.
Once he had recovered from the initial shock of learning about the "anomalous" side of the world that had existed under his nose his whole life, Antonio was excited to start his new job. He didn't care what it was as long as it had something to do with this brand-new, magical, monstrous world.
His new supervisors took no time in telling him what exactly he had signed up for; his job was to listen to calls to emergency services deemed anomalous by something called ESAS: the Emergency Services Anomaly Screening algorithm. He was supposed to listen to the calls, then verify whether they were anomalous or not. Antonio quickly decided that ESAS wasn't very good at its job, as almost all of the calls directed at him were either picked up by accident or just the product of a bad acid trip.
He sighed as he looked around his cubicle. The muted drone of other operatives talking to each other and listening to calls of their own came into focus as he surveyed the flimsy grey walls constructing his office space. Currently, the only decoration Antonio had put up was a complimentary calendar. It was themed around different objects contained by the Foundation. In theory, this would make for an interesting calendar and a nice gift- if most of the images weren't blacked out due to security reasons. As it was, it just added to the sense of dreariness permeating every part of Site-14.
Settling back into his chair, he reached out to move on to the next call. Just as he was about to click to the next one he heard a scream. Startled, he stopped moving, listening for more. After a few seconds of silence, Antonio concluded someone must be having a bit of fun playing a prank on the other operatives. A supervisor would take care of them. Readying himself for the next call, he grabbed hold of his mouse for a second time when the screaming started up again.
Antonio ignored the screaming for a minute, figuring the prankster would stop when they got tired of it. But it didn't stop. Instead more voices joined in, and he could hear the sounds of a commotion down the aisle. Emergency lights turned on, sweeping the room with bright red light every few seconds. Disturbed, he stood up, stepped to the entrance of the cubicle, and looked out. His breath caught in his throat.
A large… something was rampaging through the array of aisles. It looked like a person wearing a brown coat and a bird mask. As he watched, it reached out with its hand- no, its claw- and ripped through the face of a woman. As she fell, the person turned to face Antonio. Its mask- no, its beak- opened, and it released a horrible noise.
It sounded like a human scream mixed with the piercing caw of a crow, and with it came a blast of energy. Antonio was knocked off his feet and collapsed in the corner of his cubicle, hyperventilating. Through the fog of panic and shock in his head, he recalled the "office safety" film they'd shown him: "The area underneath your desk may function as adequate cover for minor to moderate emergencies." Forcing his limbs to move, he crawled underneath his workstation and curled up into a ball next to his computer.
What was happening? What was that… thing? Now that he had a chance to process what he saw, Antonio had deduced that it wasn't wearing a coat. Instead, it was covered with glossy umber feathers. It was like a large bird crossed with a person. His arms around his legs, he rocked back and forth as the screaming and crashing and- oh god, the wet slapping of human bodies against hard surfaces- continued.
The noises grew closer to Antonio's cubicle, and he pulled himself into a tighter ball. Through the opening of his cubicle, he could see his coworkers fleeing the creature. The nice woman that had presented him with his calender, Samantha, rushed past, when suddenly the creature was on her back, its claws digging into her flesh.
She screamed, begging for mercy, and the creature swiped at the back of her throat with its talon. Blood spurted out and she stopped pleading, unable to make any noise except for an awful gurgling. Not even ten feet away, Antonio watched silently, unable to take his eyes away. As blood endlessly pulsed out of her neck, the creature stood up straight and bent its head back.
For the first time, Antonio had a chance to get a good look at it. It was humanoid, around seven or eight feet tall, and rough brown feathers adorned its entire body. The creature's oversized parchment-yellow bird claws pierced Samantha's back. Brown, powerful wings intermittently splattered with gore unfurled from its lean chest and flapped twice as it released another horrid caw from its cruel, curved beak. The ensuing wave of energy left Antonio feeling like his brain had been microwaved. His muscles turned to jelly and it was all he could do to pull further back under his desk as he desperately tried not to draw attention to himself.
"I AM YOUR RAPTURE!" the creature cried. Its voice had the harsh, gravely yet piercing tone of a bird's call meshed with the smooth undertones of a deep-voiced man. "YOU CHOOSE TO DENY OTHERS THE WISDOM YOU DEEM YOURSELF WORTHY TO POSSESS. I AM YOUR RAPTURE, THE ONE CHOSEN TO HALT YOUR OPPRESSION OF KNOWLEDGE." It flapped its wings once. "FROM THIS DAY FORTH, YOUR 'NORMALCY,' YOUR 'VEIL' WILL BE SHATTERED, AND ALL WILL BE BEHOLDEN TO THE KNOWLEDGE YOU PREVIOUSLY KEPT UNKNOWN."
Releasing its talons from Samantha, who had mercifully gone limp, the creature flapped its wings and started rising above the ground. Powerful gusts of wind blew loose papers, the occasional dark brown feather, and calendar pages whirling through the air. The wind summoned ripples in the puddle of blood stemming from Samantha's body as the creature flew in the direction of the stairwell, toppling cubicle walls with its formidable wings.
Antonio could do nothing but sit there and watch the blood pool further toward him as the loose papers and feathers settled onto the ground. As the emergency lights continued to illuminate the walls of his cubicle periodically, Antonio realized just how wrong he had been about his new job.
"Watch your step," Site-14 General Director Jane Dani said as she hurried down the staircase from Level E to Level D. "The last thing we need right now is a broken ankle." The tiny, drab stairwell was awash with red light, lending it an otherworldly feel- which wasn't that uncommon in her line of work.
Five minutes ago, Jane had been reviewing the past month's productivity reports when the emergency lights had switched on in place of the usual stark fluorescent glare. Abner Croft, the head of Site-14 security, burst out of the Site Surveillance Center. He announced to all Level E residents that they were in the middle of a Code Scarlet Crisis Scenario: One or more hostile entities had breached site security. MTF Omicron-67 ("Zeroth Responders") was currently occupied responding to an anomalous object, leaving Site-14 with no defense except for a few dozen Security Officers.
After quelling the panic to a manageable level, Abner instructed them all to follow Evacuation Plan 14-S-04: Half of the floor was to try to exit the building via the northern stairwell, and the other half via the southern. That way at least half of them might survive. After Abner hurriedly divided the staff roughly in half, Jane found herself leading a horde of accountants, IT techs, and executives to Level A in hopes of fleeing the building.
They passed by the entrance to Level D. Level 2 and 3 Telecommunications Monitoring Operatives streamed out, joining their party. As Jane took step after curt step, her echoing footsteps just one of many in a ceaseless din, she thought of her family. Despite her stern, collected appearance, her head was a maelstrom of fears and questions. What was going on? Who was attacking? What did they want? She knew practically nothing.
Jane stumbled as the edge of her heel caught against a crack in the concrete floor. It was hard to see in the dim lighting. A nameless accountant caught her arm to help her regain her balance. "Thanks," she nodded in the direction of her aid. She needed to put up a courageous front for her employees right now. As the General Director of the Site, they were looking to her for assurance. Regardless, the panic within her was rising. If Jakob were here he'd know just how to calm her down.
Level C. This time, a horde of Level 1 Telecommunications operatives crammed themselves into the stairwell, occupying most of the little remaining space left. Jane found herself drawing her arms into her body as her thoughts shifted to those of Jakob. What was he going to do if she died here? He certainly couldn't care for their children alone.
Her panic spiked as she turned the corner. Their children. If she didn't make it home tonight, they'd be motherless. Jane was the provider for her family; without her, they'd have a small savings account and no more. What if they ended up on the streets? Jane found her breaths growing quicker and shallower as the onset of a panic attack peered through the haze of fear in her mind. Heartbeat speeding up, Jane forced herself to focus on the task at hand. There would be time to hyperventilate later. Right now, she needed to get these people to safety.
As the dark spots in her vision started disappearing, Jane spotted a sign on the wall - Level B. Almost there. She allowed herself a sigh of hesitant relief- maybe they'd be okay. Maybe they'd get out safe after all. "Almost there, everyone," she called out, to several prayers and thank-yous to various deities. Jane let a tight-lipped smirk slip at their blind faith- something everyone loses once they attain the right clearance.
Suddenly, a man burst out of the door at the bottom of the staircase. He had blood splattered on his stark off-white shirt; likely somebody else's since he seemed uninjured, if out of breath. His eyes wide with fear, lungs heaving, he started clambering up the stairs. "IT'S COMING!" he yelled, gasping for air.
As soon as Jane had processed this, the door and wall surrounding it crashed in with a shower of debris. A hulking, gore-covered… thing with massive eagle wings burst through, cracking the opposing wall. Screams started sounding as the horde of executives tailing Jane started shoving their way through the crowd, pushing confused employees who didn't know what was happening yet into the walls. One unlucky soul fell over the railing and hit the floor near the birdman with a sickening crunch.
Using the body to propel itself forwards, the birdman flew at Jane, eyes black and merciless, as Jane had the time for just one last thought:
Fuck.
The 6th Wandsman of Wisdar ripped its claws through the poised woman at the head of the crowd of fleeing Foundation worms. The others fell over each other trying to get out of the way of his talons, but he paid them little mind as his gaze snapped to the passage upwards. He screeched once, sending waves of energy rippling through the mass of bodies, and beat his wings, sending him hurling through the stairs above. Bodies flew like ragdolls as powerful gusts of wind flowed through the tiny vertical corridor.
The Wandsman knew little of the Foundation's "Site-14," beyond three simple facts:
- It's one of the Foundation's major sites
- The obfuscation of anomalies is one of its primary concerns
- It's vulnerable
It was the perfect target. Site-14 possessed all the qualities of the Foundation the Wandsman found most evil, without the security of other locations. His goal was to eliminate the servers on the top floor of the building, hindering Foundation efforts throughout the entire western half of the world. Bringing the Foundation employees he was currently tossing aside to justice was nothing more than a bonus.
Slowing his upward descent as he approached the ceiling, the Wandsman flapped his wings once, sending him crashing through the door labeled "LEVEL E" and into the server room for Site-14. The room held the hardware containing the ESAS algorithm: a technology used by the Foundation to detect anomalies throughout the western hemisphere. Looming rows of computer banks lined the room, green LEDs turned yellow by the still pulsing red emergency lights. Chairs were overturned and documents littered the floor; the room had been thrown into disarray by employees' rush to evacuate. The Wandsman was almost disappointed there were no Foundation personnel left on the floor- making them pay would have brought a smile to his beak, so to speak.
After a moment of surveying the room, the Wandsman cawed twice, unleashing a devastating wave of magical energy. The tower closest to him collapsed backward, crashing into another and starting a domino effect. Sparks flew, metal ground against metal, and the Wandsman began his actual work.
Bank after bank, tower after tower, the Wansman held no mercy for the unthinking machinery. His wicked talons gouged into CPUs, monitors, wires, and more, sliding through them like butter. Undeterred by the risk of electrocution or laceration by the jagged metal edges, he continued, destroying dozens of servers. With the annihilation of these machines, the Foundation would no longer be able to listen to human calls about anomalies, ergo, they would not be able to contain said anomalies. The Wandsmen had always been against the concealment of knowledge; the 6th Wandsman of Wisdar was simply the first to take real action.
Of course, nobody knew where he was at the moment. Most Wandsmen were pacifists- they'd rather sit in their libraries, writing articles and pleas for consideration. The Wandsman snorted. While knowledge was just as important to him as any of his peers, he was the only one who understood that action was needed for change. So he did what any good Wandsman would: he researched. He researched universes, he researched worlds within said universes, and he researched organizations within said worlds.
Eventually, he settled upon the Foundation. While other worlds had similar establishments, the Foundation was so egregiously committed to the obfuscation of knowledge and possessed so much power that the Wandsman knew he had found his target. So he prepared. He identified how the Foundation accomplished its repulsive mission, found a weak spot, and like his avian ancestor, dove for it.
Pausing again, the Wandsman beat his wings several times, blowing computer parts around the room in a silicon tornado, shredding dozens of banks. Sparks flew and metal screeched, gouging the walls and smashing the emergency lights. After the havoc wreaked here, it was obvious that Site-14 would take weeks to recover at the very least. Hopefully more. He already had his sights set on his next target and would be en route as soon as he was finished here.
The Wandsman paused once more to survey the carnage. Shards of metal littered the floor. The previously pristine, state-of-the-art server banks were in ruins, with nothing but the occasional blinking light to signal that they were ever more than useless piles of rubble. What little furniture had previously decorated the space was now nothing more than splinters. Satisfied with his work, the Wandsman turned to the west-facing wall. Summoning his strength, he let loose a powerful screech, blasting a portion of the building to dust. Running for the edge, talons crunching on shattered bricks and twisted metal, he leapt through the opening and took flight.
It was the middle of the winter in California and the sky was cast over with clouds. The sharp cold most Californians struggled with had no chance of permeating his rugged feathers. As he flew away from the scene of his triumph, he scanned the city for threats with a piercing stare- and spotted one immediately. A platoon of soldiers was spread out in front of him. Two on that building, seven in the parking garage, three jeeps scattered across a parking lot, and dozens more in various other places. Worried now, the Wandsman flew higher and faster, tucking into an paradoxical "upward dive" as he reduced the area available on his body mass. But he was too late.
Bullets whizzed past him, seconds apart and inches from hitting him. Panic rising in his mind, the 6th Wandsman of Wisar began unfurling his map. Attacking his next target would have to wait. He needed to abscond to Wandsman headquarters, regardless of the consequences. But it was too late. A round of bullets shredded his map, and in turn, his chest. With an awkward squawk of pain, the Wandsman began falling. Wind rushed through his wings and the holes in his chest as he struggled to stay afloat. More bullets, in his wings this time. Sinking into a plummet, the Wandsman had no space in his head for regret or last words through the haze of pain. His last thought before hitting the ground was one of agony. As the Foundation soldiers surrounded his body and bound him, he bled out, taking a lifetime of knowledge with him to the grave.
TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN
Regarding the recent assault of your Site-14,
Us Wandsmen send our deepest condolences. We know all too well how it feels to suffer an attack from what one perceives as a great evil, and we know our words cannot begin to repay you for the lives and costs you have suffered. In respect to your assailant, we have much the same view as you. The 6th Wandsman of Wisdar, as was his title, acted on his own, unannounced, and against our core principles. Had we known of his mission before he took flight, we would have taken every effort to stop him. As it stands, the Wandsmen at large had nothing to do with his attack and everything against it. His tale will be preserved as a cautionary anecdote for those following in his footsteps.
- The Third Wandswoman of Aellei
Setting the letter down on his desk, Kevan Samuels sighed. He could barely muster the energy to feel slighted by the Wandsmen's words. While they claimed no part in the recent attack on Site-14, tensions between the interdimensional reporters and the Foundation had heightened nonetheless. That was the Department of Advanced Diplomacy's job to take care of. Kevan had more than enough on his plate already.
Stretching, Kevan got out of his seat and walked three feet to the door of his new office. Foundation cleanup crews were still hard at work clearing rubble and searching for usable parts among the wreckage littering Level E. While most of the smaller chunks of debris were gone, twisted computer towers still littered the room, IT technicians flitting from one to the next to identify anything salvageable. It would be weeks at the very least until ESAS was functional again. This meant that in addition to the cost of repairing the site, Site-14's budget would have to go towards not just hiring more employees to- Kevan grimaced as he thought the words- replace those who had been lost during the attack, but also towards overtime pay for employees picking up ESAS's slack.
Kevan groaned and looked away, needing a distraction from the dozens of tasks sitting before him. At this rate, he was going to get another migraine. His gaze settled upon his new desk. Covering it sat relics from its previous owner, the last General Director of Site-14, Jane Dani. A cup reading "World's [REDACTED] Director" held half a dozen pens and pencils, all sharpened to a point. Lined up in a neat row were artifacts from home: a crayon drawing, a colorful bracelet, and a family picture. A state-of-the-art modem was positioned in the corner, dust covering the keyboard. Kevan let out a weak chuckle. Jane never was great with technology.
Heart sinking, Kevan tried not to think of his old mentor. Tried not to think of stepping over her body to flee from the attacker. Tried not to think of scrubbing her blood from his clothes. Tried not to think of sobbing himself to sleep that night, haunted by the ghosts of his coworkers and the responsibilities of his future. Focusing his attention back on his new duties, Kevan sighed and put his head in his hands. He wasn't ready for this.
