Pain.

     Flashes of sound.

     The smell of cupid.

     Hunger.

     The taste of cold.

     Dredd suddenly bolted upright, the images of the dream still echoing behind his eyes.  Lights flickered overhead and a rapid beeping filled his ears.  A broken light fixture was swinging back and forth a few feet away.  Lifting his arm, he saw tubes of red liquid.  A small clamp on his finger blinked in time with the beeps, and to his left he saw a green pulse monitor.

     127 heartbeats per minute?  That was high, wasn't it?

     He heard distant gunfire.  The surgery room appeared empty.  There was a set of double doors and one wall dominated by a long mirror.  A shattered mirror.  He was on some sort of metal table, tilted at nearly a 45-degree angle.  He was wearing only a pair of green hospital pants.  There were brackets at his wrists and ankles, but they were open.

     Then, quite suddenly, he smelled it.  There was blood.  Looking down among the flickering light, he saw the bodies all around.
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:58, Fri 23 Dec 2016.

It was the blood, of course.  This is what claimed his attention the most, and for some reason he did not understand, he stared at it for what must have seemed an inordinately long time.  Could not seem to tear his eyes away from it, which seemed both absurdly morbid, and naturally fascinating at the same time.  What is wrong with me? was the thought that came to mind, and as soon as it did, he was able to tear his gaze away and really take note of his surroundings.  A hospital room, medical equipment, dead bodies; presumably doctors of some sort because they were wearing scrubs and such.  What he was doing in a hospital, he could not say, but it was certainly something to get to the bottom of once he fully got his bearings.

With a shake of his head, not to clear it, but rather to further understand what was going on, he raised a hand to rub the top of his dome and was reminded that his finger was still attached to a finger clamp and his arm to some tubes.  He shook the clamp off and gingerly pulled the tubes from his arm, not caring if it was the right thing to do or not.  He was here for a reason, he assumed, but he felt fine, more than fine, so he would not worry about it for now.  Besides, he noticed, for the very first time, that he had somehow acquired tattoos.  That in itself was almost the strangest thing, because he was never a tattoo kind of guy and would never have considered getting one.  He could only hope it was not the permanent kind for, even though they looked good (a kind of tribal, ritualistic pattern) were not his deal.

Still, his gaze brought him back to what lay before him ... a pile of dead bodies.  Not really a pile, more simply bodies strewn all over the immediate space.  Looking around again, he caught site of the shattered mirror and small glimpses of himself as he stood to full height, the flickering light above adding to the surreal effect.  He also heard the beeping coalesce into a long, uninterrupted sound, which paled in comparison to the second round of gunfire coming from outside somewhere, presumably one of the corridors.  This one caused him to instinctively crouch into a defensive position and, looking around, he reached for something he thought he might be able to defend himself with before moving to the double doors and peering out slightly to survey what might be ahead of him.

     The lights in the hallway were flickering as well, but apparently deserted.  There was another set of double doors directly across the hall, and an elevator at the far end.  The other way led to another set of double doors with small windows.  There were bloody footprints all around, and bloody drag marks leading out of the opposite doors and toward the end of the hall.  There were no footprints around the elevator.

     The walls were mostly bare and there was no equipment in the hall.

Crouching where he was by the door, he took another brief second to ascertain when he should be moving, but then decided simply to move.  There was no way to tell, not in this situation, when or even if there was a best time to scoot, so he might as well get going.  It was a shame he could not hang back and try to find some kind of information either about the place or who worked here, but getting out was the priority.  In that micro second of thought, he believed he could hear sounds as if from far off, but it must be the situation getting to him.  As well, he could find nothing with which to defend himself if he got attacked, so that put him a little on edge also.

Fully poking his head through the double doors, he looked left, then right, and took another second to stare at the elevator before moving as quietly as he could through those doors and towards the contraption.  However, rather than press the button and wait for it to arrive, he searched for a different avenue of escape, one which involved stairs and a possible exit.  Tight, enclosed spaces were not the best things to be caught in when some mysterious people had automatic weapons.

[Private to GM: 18:50, Today: Secret Roll: Dredd Bloodkin rolled 24 using 1d20+12.  Perception.]
This message was last edited by the GM at 23:59, Fri 23 Dec 2016.

     There was a door next to him, and he had passed a few others along the hallway.  The elevator call button lit up and he could hear the mechanisms moving inside.  There was nothing to indicate what floor he was on, or what floor the elevator was on.  He could tell the elevator was coming down.

     He noticed a bit of blood on his arm.  It seemed like it had come from a cut on his bicep, but there was no cut there.

He glanced over at the door at about the same time the elevator lit up, indicating it was either on the move or about to be.  Hurrying over to the door, he listened closely for any sounds beyond.  That is when he noticed his arm ... and the blood.  Looking at it, it seemed as if he was being pulled into it's inky hue, the darkness of the red almost blinding in a polished, artistic kind of way.  Again, for however long it took him to notice he was simply standing there staring at blood, he had been drawn into a space where only he and the blood existed, where the only sounds were his own breathing, and the blood itself, calling out in a silent whisper which drew him to it in a way he could not understand but, ultimately, did not care to.  If the blood called, he would listen ... always.

Suddenly, the sound of the elevator broke his focus and made him once again aware of where he was and the situation he found himself in.  His hand waited on the doorknob as he listened.


[Private to Omni-Tent: I am assuming this is a door with a window of some sort, which will allow Dredd to peer through.  If not, he will simply make his way to the bottom of the stairs, if this is, indeed, a stairwell.]
This message was last edited by the GM at 21:52, Wed 28 Dec 2016.

     Hearing nothing inside the room, he moved inside and found a metal stairwell leading upwards.  There were no windows or signs, and the lighting on the side of the wall was also flickering.  A broken camera was hanging limply from it's bracket in a corner of the wall.  The stairs only seemed to go up one level.

     Behind him, the elevator dinged and the metal doors opened.  The elevator car was a good size and had another door on the far side.  It was at least big enough about a dozen people, almost like a cargo elevator.

     He heard a blood-curdling scream from up the other end of the hall and beyond the double doors.  A dark shape shifted across the intermittent darkness beyond the door's windows.

He would have been on the move if not for two things: the first was the elevator door opening.  He wanted to get a look at someone, anyone who was still alive in this place, purely to gauge what he might be up against.  Second was the scream and the dark shape, which is what had him staying put for maybe a bit longer than he should have.  It truly was a difficult position for him, but he decided getting out had to be the utmost priority.  That had not, could not change so, he followed the stairwell upward as quickly and as quietly as he could, all the while regretting he did not have a bit more time to hide, watch, study, observe.  Then again, if he made it out of here and got away, he would be making certain he knew exactly what this place was, what it was called, the address and locale, and anything else which would make it easier to find for his return, because if he knew one thing, it was that he would be returning, and not as some experiment.

     At the top of the stairs were two doors, one marked as an emergency exit with an attached alarm bar.

     Peering through the other door, he saw a hallway with a few branches, and windows at both ends. There was also the elevator door, and another door on the far side of the elevator.  The floors were tile and the walls were beige, decorated with various posters in French that seemed to be about dental health.
This message was last edited by the GM at 16:27, Thu 29 Dec 2016.

This place seemed to be a maze.  No matter where he turned, there was no simple way out and every potential exit seemed fraught with peril of some sort.  With an almost knowing sigh, he looked at the bar, then all around the door, taking the time to see if the bar could be pushed or lifted  without any bells or loud ringing sounding out, or if he could find some way to find the actual alarm and deactivate it in some way.  He understood he had nothing on his person with which to disarm an alarm, but choices, even if it was one more than zero, were always a better thing to have.


[Private to Omni-Tent: 16:48, Today: Dredd Bloodkin rolled 15 using 1d20+12 ((3)).]