Bane of Utopia — "Chapter One: The Alcove" – Locked for dead.

[SWAT One]

Bane of Utopia

Name:  Michael Dubois
Age:  16
Date:  May 15, 2073

You sit on a dingy plastic crate in a concrete cellar lit by a single flickering bulb and filled with crates.  Many of these crates are empty, though some are filled with rotten or poisoned food, the smell of which assaults your nostrils in a most unpleasant way.  A rat darts from behind one crate to another, where it pokes its head around a corner, staring at you.  It's hungry, just like you.  Just like most of the others in this Godforsaken stuffhole.

It was two years since you've seen your family.  You remember your little brother.  You last remember him helping your dad walk, escaping behind the New World Bank in Victory City from a dangerous lot who call themselves "The Flogging Force".  No one remembers them fondly nowadays.  It's hard to think that there was a time that anyone thought them as human, much less revered them– an opinion reserved for a few.  Now the only thing anyone remembers about them is the destruction of a Utopia, and the murder of nine-tenths of the entire population of Utopia.  Everyone remembers how they gunned down civilians in the streets, rounded them up and killed them by showering them with chemicals to reduce them to nothing, and setting Victory City ablaze.  There was so much blood in the streets that those who managed to see it and escaped saw great pools of blood boiling from the heat of the fires.  It was only a part of their atrocities.

You remember the last image of your dad was that he was being led by your brother behind that building.  He was shot in his right ankle, grazed along his left side, and his left ear was shot off completely.  The last you remember of him was holding onto your brother, soaked in blood, amidst many other people running about, some wounded from various means, others just glad they had two feet to sta—

You stop.  You find yourself breathing heavily and in a cold sweat.  It's too painful to remember.

At the end of the room is a wooden door with a grimy metal handle.

[Ad Bot]

[SWAT One]

Reserved.

[blazerblock2]

Well, search for unspoiled food I guess.  Start with the containers.

[SWAT One]

You open the nearest crate to be met by a few roaches flying out, which startles you, and you fall on your back.

You get up, rubbing your shoulder and hesitatingly peek in the box.  You see and smell rotten potatoes with a dead rat, rat feces and a ton of roaches spread over it.  The smell is overpowering.  You feel dizzy and close the box.  Though you are hungry, you are not sure if you lost your appetite or not.

There are also some burlap rags and tarps around the room, some of them, dry.

There's a small window at one of the top edges of the cellar.  It appears to be late morning.

[blazerblock2]

Take the dry rags and taps.  They could come in handy later.

[SWAT One]

You grab some of the tarps, and mats, and inspect them, and roll up the choicest and dryest bits.  As you pick up the last tarp, you hear a small item clattering on the ground.  It's a small knife.  You bind them up with a few strings and strips of the burlap tarps which you cut with the knife.

Some great finds.

*Knock knock knock*

"‘Ey, Mike, we're all done here.  You find anything?"

This is the voice of Charles Jackson.  He's a man who lived in Redwood Cove, a slum of Victory City, before all of Victory City and its outlying boroughs were burnt down or demolished.

He was the first kindness you have seen since that night.  Long story short, he fed you when you were starving miles out from Victory City.

[TristanLuigi]

Tell the kind man that you could not find any good food, but have some useful materials. Ask him if you should keep looking or if you should go with him.

[blazerblock2]

Depart with your good friend Charles.

[SWAT One]

Tell the kind man that you could not find any good food, but have some useful materials. Ask him if you should keep looking or if you should go with him.

You pocket the knife.  Will definitely come in handy.

Michael:  "Eh, yeah, I found some dry tarps.  No food, though.  Everything here is rotten.  Should I look any further?"

Charles:  "That's fine.  We found some bread in here.  We should be fine for now.  Tom* didn't see any more looters or any of those damn masked bastards**."

*Tom Thatcher, a man of 23.  He has joined you and Charles soon after Utopia collapsed.

**Referring to the Flogging Force.

Charles holds open the door for you.  "Oh damn!" he exclaims, stepping back, clenching his nose.  He gladly closes the door as soon as you leave.

You carry the tarps out and set them on a table in a larger basement room, and set the knife on the table.  "Also found this."

Charles nods, and puts a crate of bread on the table.  "This is all we could afford to carry right now.  I'll tell Tom we're heading out."

Charles walks off to the other end of the basement to a set of stairs and ascends.

You look around the room for anything else you could grab.  There's a box of rusty nails, some short pieces of wood from crates that either fell apart or were in some way hacked to pieces.  You also see that there are a few pipes here and there.  Some had already been ripped out– long since used, and some bare wires sticking out of the wall.  There's also a well-boarded-up walk-in refrigerator door to your left.

[Doom Mantis]

Perhaps implement nails into wire to serve as a conductor? (I mean, a nail connecting both of the exposed ends of the wire)
Grab rusty pipe and use it to break boards off fridge.

[TristanLuigi]

Use a pipe as a hammer to embed a rusty nail into a board for a basic weapon. It might even give your enemies tetstar fish.

[Doom Mantis]

Use a pipe as a hammer to embed a rusty nail into a board for a basic weapon. It might even give your enemies tetstar fish.

You are a genius.


(Then dual wield both the nail-board and pipe)

Perhaps implement nails into wire to serve as a conductor? (I mean, a nail connecting both of the exposed ends of the wire)
Grab rusty pipe and use it to break boards off fridge.

Both options work for me.

[SWAT One]

Use a pipe as a hammer to embed a rusty nail into a board for a basic weapon. It might even give your enemies tetstar fish.

You grab a plank and a pipe and hammer the nail through with the pipe.  It seems to have made a basic weapon.  You nail one through in the opposite direction so that you can get them in a reverse swing, too.

Charles comes quickly but quietly down the stairs and walks briskly over to you with a worried look on his face.  "Shhhhh!  Keep it down!" Charles whispers nervously.  "Tom spotted some people in the bushes 200 yards away, probably 4 of them.  His gun only has 2 shots left, and we can't afford to let ourselves be known now.  We don't even know if they have guns, or if they've spotted us."

With that, Charles leaves as quickly as he came.

Perhaps implement nails into wire to serve as a conductor? (I mean, a nail connecting both of the exposed ends of the wire)
Grab rusty pipe and use it to break boards off fridge.

You look at your weapon and then at the wall, and then back at the nails.  Your curiosity overcomes you.

You drag a nearby rubber mat under your place of operation, and wrap a wire around one side of the nail, and then begin to wrap the wire around the nail when lights star blaring and sirens go off–

*BRRR BRRR BRRR BRRR*

stuff.  Now you've done it.

Charles and Tom come rushing down the stairs, Tom carrying his AR-14.

Charles:  "Damnit Mike!"
Tom:  "They're headed this way– 4 of them, and they have guns!

Charles stacks a few crates in front of the entrance from which they came and turns around after blocking most of the entrance.

Everyone grabs what they can.  You grab your tarps, pocket your knife, and your new weapon.  Charles grabs a crate of bread, and Tom grabs some boards under his arm, all wrapped up into a tarp.

By the time you reach the back exit, you hear shouting from the other door, and shadows through gaps of the stacked crates.  As you turn around to close the door, you see a muzzle flash and the concrete next to you receives a dent.  Bits of rubble scrape your cheek, and you manage to close the door and get on the ground before a few bullets fly through the door.

Charles and Tom are now ahead of you.  Tom opens the back door slightly, and peeks out, slowly inching out of the exit.

Tom:  (Whispering) " All clear!"

He swings the door wide and you all escape into the woods behind the warehouse.

[Doom Mantis]

Give Charles the pocket knife,
and give Tom the pipe.

[SWAT One]

Give Charles the pocket knife,
and give Tom the pipe.

You stop for breath and hand Charles the knife.  "Thanks."

You seem to have left the pipe behind.  Oh well.  It would be stupid to go back there.

There are still screams in the forest behind you.  They're not far in pursuit."

Tom:  "Run!"

You continue running with Tom and Charles.  Your hideout isn't too far from here.