I'll concede to Alphas Sons point, and start planning moving upriver.

I will start scouting upriver for a good location to move the tribes to, I'm hoping for one that would be a long days journey but still doable in a day.

Otherwise I'm mostly just waiting for time to pass, keeping up with the training but looking forward to things starting to get back to normal.

Quick question. Are you planning to scout an entire day up river, then? That would mean either striking camp or staying up all night walking back. Also, are you bringing anyone, and if so whom?

Meant a day of the tribe moving, which I imagined would move much slower than just two people. Either way, not going to explore during the dark so my limit is half a day out then half a day back at my speed (with any two links from the spear group) or the distance I think I could get the entire tribe to travel in a day. Whichever I believe is less.

So it has been a few days since your venture into the woods, pushing a week, and you've grabbed a couple of links to come with you on a journey to find an appropriate space for everyone to move.

Alpha's Son has started moving more due to your encouragement, and he's resting against a tree, mostly leaning against it while Friendly Link is stabilizing him. They speak English to one another across the camp from you, with some Caveman sign language as well.

The men are drilling with Big Link and Alpha Link, who finally seem to be getting along better and working together very well. They've begun incorporating wrestling into the men's training schedule as well.

Women watch the children play in the river, the water level of which is still declining daily.

And then you hear the hum. It's faint, but then grows louder, and reminds you of the same hum the violent spheres made when they were floating so close to you. There's no buzzing, and the hum gets louder. Soon, people are looking around for the source, which you determine is across the river. The noise is getting even louder, and you see glints through the trees as some sort of metal craft approaches above the tree line in yours and the Big River Tribe's direction.

While I'm still concerned for the well being of the tribe, I am really happy with the effect I've had here, between getting alpha and big link to work together well, encouraging the adoption of verbal language, if only by those closest to me, and the development of a militia that can use tools to defend themselves. I'm having a brief moment of reflecting and feeling proud before I hear the hum that jars me from that idea.

As soon as I see the metallic glints I yell to everyone to get behind the cover of the trees. Specifically getting the group that is training with the spears to herd everyone further into the forest on our side, away from the clearing that the river has. I'll then rush to alphas sons side, and with friendly links help get him to his feet and move in the direction I was getting everyone else to go, trying to use the tree line to work to our advantage so we're not visible.

Once everyone is behind the tree line a good distance I'll tell alphas son that I'm going to scout the edge if the edge if the treeline. We need to know what's happening. Have everyone start gathering up what they have and moving upstream. I've been scouting the area as we discussed and it looks like we need to move sooner than expected.

And with that I'm doubling back, with a spear, to where I can see the ship and what they are doing while still hopefully being hidden.

In response to your raise of the alarm, the women and children start moving immediately to the treeline, herded by the militia you've formed.

You run to help Friendly Link and Alpha's Son move more into the cover of the trees, but by then the hum is above you, and you look back to see men and spheres both dropping down to your side of the river gently from the center of the large, black-and-white ship. The men are wearing head-to-toe black plastic armor, with respirators over their faces hiding them. They each carry a dangling collection of rings almost a foot in diameter about their belts and rifles in their hands you've never seen before.

And they all hit the ground running (or hovering, where it concerns the spheres) into the trees after you and the rest.

You see over ten of the men drop while three spheres pursue as well.

I'll turn to alphas son and friendly link and tell them I'll buy them what time I can. If I'm lucky they'll understand me. If not I hope to give the tribe enough time to get far enough away. Whatever you do don't appear threatening to them though.

And I'm not giving them an opportunity to either come with me or argue, I turn back towards the oncoming men, drop my spear, and raise my hands in surrender. If any of the links start coming to back me up I'll yell no, run.

Then towards the men in armor "please don't hurt them, they're intelligent creatures and only wish to live in peace. I can tell you anything you need to know and am willing to cooperate. Just leave them be."

I'm hoping that this is something akin to a capture squad, and I definitely have no way of opposing that many. Trying to appear as non threatening as possible. Which shouldn't be too much of a problem considering the amount of power they have compared to me.

As they approach, you get a better look at them, specifically a few that have orange bands on their shoulders, which you infer signifies rank. They continue running into the woods as the first ones reach your position, but two towards the back slow down and roughly grab you by your shoulders, not responding to the words you're pleading to them.

They push you down hard and you feel like you're punched hard in the chest, followed by a sting then a soothing sensation spreads from that spot all throughout your body.

----

Soon, you wake in a sitting position, resting against a wall. You have your same clothes on you, but none of your possessions. The room is dark, the floor is hard, smooth, and cold. And you see some movement of others on the other side of the room, as well as to your immediate left and right.

You feel something cold on the back of your neck, and reach your hand up to it. Then, you realize that it's cold all the way around it, as you feel a hard, metal collar on you, attached connected somehow to the wall behind you.

I groan when I come to consciousness, and try to shake off any wooziness. Then I start trying to take in the surroundings and letting my eyes adjust to the darkness.

Is the floor metal?
Do I hear the thrumming noise or feel any motion that would seem to indicate we're on the moving ship versus being back at a compound?
Can I see any of the links? Are they the others in this room with me?
Do I see a door?

After taking that in I will say loudly, but not shouting, "Can someone please tell me what you intend to do with us?"

And then in a normal talking voice, while waiting to see if there is a response, talk to any links there to try and figure out who all was captured and if any escaped. Also if our captors have done anything while I was unconscious.

You try to keep calm and let your senses adjust to your new near-zero-light environment. Soon, you can make out easier shapes and you count fourteen others sitting against the walls like you. Six are on your side with you and eight are on the other side.

When you groan, you feel a callused hand touch your shoulder, and see that it's from the link next to you, to your right.

By your best guess, the floor may be metal. And when you listen close, you can hear the breathing of your companions, and yes the humming sound of their levitating machines. However, it's far quieter inside of here. Still, you do start feeling a little bit of movement from the vessel now that you're concentrating on it.

When you announce your question, you hear some of the people in the compartment you're in groan, while most remain quiet. One male voice responds to yours though, from across the compartment. You recognize the voice from spear training, but can't quite place it. He speaks in extremely broken English, not like Alpha's Son and Friendly Link had developed. "What..." he growls a little in thought, and says, "Monsters?"

I quickly realize that a whole bunch of these links are going to need my reassurance to stay calm. As such I'll try to adopt my calmest voice when responding to the link who answered me.

"No, or at least I doubt it. More like a different tribe, if they had wanted to kill us, we would be dead not captured. It's just very important for all of us to stay calm. I'm hoping at some point to be allowed to talk to one of them and sort out our differences. But we'll have to wait for them to initiate that. Just good behavior for now."

And I'll try and get a little rest. While resting I'll try to feel where bothy gear is relative to here and that rewards card I hurried near big links original cave.

Worth noting is I'm both trying to keep the group calm through speech and example but also make myself look like one of the leaders from the perspective of an observer. They will probably want to talk to someone they see as being in charge eventually and I would prefer that to be me.

"Don't know your words... But will wait? Attack later..." You realize that he's part of the spear trainees and learned the most rudimentary English, where most of his verbal skills lie in commands that you'd give when hunting or scouting.

You feel both of those senses, but can't distinguish between them. One pull is a little to the right, one a little to the left, and both slightly down from where you are right now.

The links in the compartment with you start to wake up more now, and hold their breaths until you start talking in a reassuring tone. While some seemed panicked at first, you believe that you helped keep their emotions under control and at least stem the fear for now.

Eventually, though, you feel butterflies in your stomach and can feel the ship start decelerating and going down, until it finally stops. A door in the compartment opens outward and you get a look at those around you. The one who spoke earlier-the only one to speak other than you-is definitely one of the links who trained with the spear. You recall he wasn't half bad with a spear, but his tactical skills were lacking.

The rest are men who opted out of spear training, women, and a couple young boys no older than 12. All have thick, black, metal collars around their necks, which you recognize from the strike team members' belts. They seem somehow attached to the metal walls.

When the doors open I'll continue talking reassuringly to the group, encouraging cooperating and not struggling when they come to move us. I'm also looking towards the door to see who or what comes for us.

Am I able to stand or does the collar keep me too low to the ground? If I can stand, I will as I wait for someone to come being us wherever we're going next.

It takes time for your eyes to adjust to the new presence of natural light, but they do after only brief pain. Outside, you see several of the same men, armed and still covered head to toe. Six stand in a semicircle at the entrance, while two are facing one another inside of the semicircle on the ramp leading up to the compartment you're resting in.

When you try to rise, you realize that the collar does keep you from that, forcing you in a sitting position on the floor of the metal compartment.

Then, you see that one of the two facing one another points at you. Unlike the majority of his comrades, he has a red stripe on his upper arm, and his companion has three stripes: two red with one gold between them. Gold stripe nods, then walks away.

Red stripe and one of the plain ones approach you, with a long metal pole in hand that looks approximately eight feet long. Red stripe puts it on your collar, and you feel yourself released from the wall. But then, he uses the pole, now attached to the collar, to drag you up to your feet, and attempts to lead you away out into the light.

OOC: What are you wearing at this point? I recall that you tore your shirt badly when you tried to save that injured link, and also tore it more in the brush when running toward and then away from the spheres.

When he starts leading me put I comply fully. Making sure he doesn't need to try to force me and also trying to display my compliance.

As to what I'm wearing, I imagined that I had switched to one of my extra shirts after tearing my one to make bandages but didn't change it after the tears from the thorns. I also imagine I have my tan cargo shorts on. So a very torn grey tshirt and worn tan shorts.

Out of fear of making them angry, I will wait to talk until they ask me to. But trying to keep my body language saying that I'm not trying to cause problems.

So you let them pull you out, and realize that you probably look strikingly similar to a dog being caught by a dog catcher. Still, you keep your feet and follow them out, and you see that you're in a cleared out area with stumps and freshly-filled holes where stumps have been pulled out. Metal ships of several different kinds are everywhere, with plastic tents near them. You see that everyone out in the open has a blacked-out mask on like the security men who lead you.

You see a few units of them in full gear drilling while others are taking patrols. A few are in less gear, but still covered head to toe maintaining the white spherical drones you'd seen before. Repaired drones follow some of the men patrolling the area. It seems like there's one drone per patrol group, usually consisting of no more than three men.

The ones leading you pull you over just outside a tent, where another one of them walks out with a device that looks like a thick tablet. When the tent opens, a strong odor hits your face to make you dizzy, until the tent is closed air-tight again.

The gold striped one thrusts the tablet in front of you, and you recognize the images as the gold striped man swipes his finger across to reveal several different images. He points at the images, all of various metals you recognize as gold, iron, copper, and others. Then, he shows more of what they look like as ore, and points at a mountain looming over their large camp.

Beyond the mountain and above, you see something that makes your jaw drop. It looks like an enormous building, made all of metal and built in the shape of a funnel. Above looms a dark, dense storm cloud being sucked into the funnel-shaped building raging with thunder and lightning as it is perpetually sucked below.

Have I seen any of them out of the masks yet?  And when the odor from the tent hits me does it smell like anything I know?

After he gets done showing me the information I'll try responding in English "So you're looking for various precious metals either refined or ore, and your harnessing the power of the storms to either dig deeper into the mountain where you expect these or simply to generate electricity to run everything on. I'm probably missing some things, but I haven't seen any of these metals since I've gotten here, or my spears would be metallic and not stone. What is it you want from us?"

While saying this I'm concentrating to mostly be looking at the person who showed me the tablet, but occasionally glancing at the storm funnel. I can't help be curious of both the technical marvels required to do that as well as the potentially disastrous side effects of tapping into it too much. It's most likely the cause of the water issues, if not more besides that.

Nope, you haven't seen any outside of masks yet. Actually, I was mistaken. When that tent flap was opened, you didn't smell anything different, but you could tell that the air was wrong. It made you dizzy in a matter of seconds. Additionally, it's clear that the tents are plastic and air-tight.

They make no response to you, but you see that one of the masked men nods to the other. They thrust the tablet into your hand, and then move you along. The storm funnel continues, and soon they lead you to another part of the camp that looks more run-down.

The new camp is at the foot of the mountain and has a single guard tower in the middle surrounded by just space, stumps, and links with metal collars around their necks. You recognize a few, but some are completely unfamiliar. They loiter in small groups. The only shelter is a large, open-area space under the guard tower.

Surrounding the guard tower fifty yards in each direction are lines of metal posts, with black orbs the same color as your collars on their tops. They hum very quietly as you approach the line. When you reach it, the post stops humming and they push you through.

Once you're through, it begins humming again, and you're inside their fenced-in area.

I still haven't seen friendly link, alphas son, alpha or big link have I?

Of the links that are inside the fence with me, I'm looking for common themes. Out of the ones I know are they the more intelligent of the group, or all male, or the healthiest. My current working theory is I'm in the equivalent of a giant electric fence, where I'm supposed to explain to the links what we're looking for before delving into the mountain to find examples of this. Also at the forefront of my mind is the reasons these technologically advanced peoples would require the help, and my guess is that their atmosphere is volatile in combination with some of the material we may come in contact with. Which brings me around to the fact that I believe that absolutely have to be aliens at this point, which scares me a little, but I can't afford to be scared right now. I have to focus.

 And with that I'll start trying to figure out exactly how much this tablet will tell me. Are there menus or is just a slide show? Any writing of any kind? Either on the screen or the case?

And do any of the links react to  seeing me enter?

It takes you a second of experimenting with the tablet, but you realize that it has more functions than you have access to. You can slide through the slideshow like they showed you or enter the gallery, which is only of the pictures they've given you.

The language is completely unfamiliar to you, but you work your way around by pressing keys regardless. Whenever you try to exit from the running program, a password entry screen comes up. Whenever you try to view a separate gallery, a password entry screen comes up; however, you do see that there are many galleries of images (only one of which you have access to without a password). You can access the settings to adjust brightness, volume (though it is making no noise in the gallery), and some others that you don't know what they're for. One you realize is a password reset, but has three blank entry screens.

At first, the group was just lost and communicating with one another and ignoring you; however, when the guards walked away again, everyone looked to you hopefully before looking back to one another, abject. The only ones who kept eyes on you were a small collection (14) who recognized you. They move over to you, smiling, and bring you in for hugs. One signs to you that she's happy you're okay, and all of them ask you if you've seen any others.

You can't assess any similarities of the links present except that they aren't injured. You see men and women, elderly on their last leg and children on their first. One of the links in another group who are keeping to themselves is only a baby, being held by one of the females on her hip. Most are in their prime, though, but of various strength.

Have I been able to pull up a keyboard during my exploring process? If so I'm curious how many letters are on the keyboard and will start trying to commit the differences in the symbols to memory. My goal is to try and decipher the language by what words would make sense where I see them used. I'll also being keeping and eye out for if hype fence or anything had writing on them.

Does the tablet seem to have a battery indicator?

I'll sign back to the small group that I was in a room with a number of other links, but I haven't located everyone yet. I'll ask if one of them wouldn't mind me looking at the collar around their neck. I can't see mine well enough and I'm curious. (I'm both looking for writing and for obvious latching mechanisms.) I'll also ask if they've talked to any of the links that have been here longer about what they have us do and that I don't think they mean to harm us, but I also don't believe they have our best interests in mind.

And then I pause for a moment and go to both signing and talking in English as I had made a habit around camp, trying to soothe everyone and explain we just need to stick together and I'll do everything I can to keep us safe and reunite us with the rest.

Past that I'm going to spend most of my time studying this tablet, explaining to any link who asks me that these are the reasons these people are here, they're looking for these metals, and also that I'm trying to learn their language to communicate.

Has the tablet shown any sign of having a means or use other than physical manipulation? Now that I'm convinced these are aliens (and still pushing off the thought of exactly what has happened, as the this is another unknown past how I woke up in the jungle in the first place, which was so long ago now...) I'm starting to consider the possibilities that mental energies may be used as so many sci fi shows have had. I'm going over everything I saw the aliens do when interacting with their technology to make sure know how they control them.

You have been able to pull up a keyboard, and have found sixty-four different characters on it. After looking through the menu options, and assuming that the words are similar enough to English to transfer into whatever functions the tablet has, you deduce what symbols make up the word "Password", "Settings", "Pictures/Gallery", the characters for numbers 1 through 20, and possibly "Exit/Escape". But the characters are still unfamiliar for all of those words, so you'd have to reference back to the tablet to be sure.

You don't see any writing on the posts nor do you recall seeing any on their equipment.

The tablet does indeed have a battery indicator, which seems to read a full charge.

You were in the compartment with the same fourteen you see in front of you. The male who knows a little English from your spear training sessions volunteers for you to check out his collar. The collar is black, and you can't get an entire finger inside the space between it and the neck. It seems to be one solid piece of metal at first, until you see some grooves along the front where it must have snapped in place and on the back, there are tiny hinges. The metal also feels smooth to the touch, extremely smooth.

But the most interesting thing is that when you approach close enough with your face to examine it, you feel a slight force pushing back away from you, and notice that it's the two collars pushing back from one another. It isn't a force you can't overcome, but it is a little uncomfortable.

The links say that they haven't talked to any of the others-they're strangers. Who knows where they're from and if they're the cause of all of this?

You examine the outside of the tablet, and find a battery pack, but it's held in by what look like tiny nails, rather than screws, which rest flush with the device. The device does go dark after a period of non-use, but once you touch it again, it turns back on. There are no buttons on the outside.

I'll reassure the group that the other links are most likely in the same predicament we are, or else they wouldn't be behind this fence as well. I'll also mention I'm going to go talk to them, and walk over.

I'm looking for any link outside the 14 that I know that looks curious about either me or the tablet. I'll introduce myself and ask how long they have been here and if he knows what they want from us. I'm doing my speaking in English while pantomiming in the link language again.

The push I felt sounds magnetic, could I tell if it got stronger as I got closer or just once at a certain threshold it exists and before that it doesn't?

I'm going to pay attention to the battery of use tablet off and on. I'm curious how quickly it diminishes.

You approach a likely group of links, five of them total in their huddle. They look abject, scared, worried, and depressed. They're sitting on the ground, some fiddling with the grass and just starting into space until you approach. Then, the three men among the four step up between you, the one female with them, and the baby she's holding in her arms.

They adopt a similar position that you've adopted with your Caveman Wrestling, and they snarl at you. The three are all young men, two probably in their late teens while one is maybe 12 or 13.

They visibly relax when you start trying to communicate with them, but they hold their ground against you, and slowly you're able to start communicating that you don't understand what is happening and want to know if they do. One of the older boys shakes his head, they don't know. They were travelling, trying to find food or game that was still good when they were taken by these demons that flew down from a great bird.


------
Caveman Sign Language +@1, new dialect.

I'll communicate that we should all stick together. I'll try talking to... And at this point I'll try communicating that our captors are not exactly demons, and I hope to reason with them.... Our captors but I have to learn how they talk first. For now though we should all stick together.

And with their agreement I'll bring them over to the 14 I know and introduce them.

I'll then start going around to each clique and work on unifying everyone and getting any information of what they have had us do here and how long everyone has been here. Same base message to everyone though, getting them calm and conveying we need to work together.