Metal man and a Monkey (Closed to Chroma)

[Break the silence]

Is it bunnying if its your alternate account?
Dark sat in a tavern with Train III purring in his lap. Outside it was raining buckets. Sitting across from him was Chroma, his lifelong friend and traveling companion. Dark was now 68, while Chroma still looked 21. Both had strong drinks in their hands and glum looks on their faces. To their left the bartender stood washing a glass behind the Bar. The only other person in the bar was a single man, sitting alone, Dark thought he recognized the man. Then he lost his train of thought.

"How long do I have left Chroma?" the old rogue asked his cyborg friend. One of Chroma's many powers he had recovered over their journey was the ability to detect life force. The corners of Chroma's lips sagged into a frown, he had watched Dark's life force slowly die. "Perhaps two weeks." he said solemnly, which caused Dark to laugh, "At least I had a good run" he said forcing a smile. But Chroma knew the laugh had been for his benefit.

Both frowned at the thought. They had become such great friends in their many grand adventures together. The idea of burying his friend just seemed to cruel a concept for Chroma to bear. But Dark didn't want to think about that, he just wanted to the remember the good old time, like the day he met Chroma......

It had been after a huge spring storm, branches had been thrown through the air like javelins as his father's carriage slowly made it's way to the sleepy town of Underwood. Dark skulked sourly looking out the window while his bastard father snored like a bear. The one good thing about the situation was Train, his furry kitten he had found right after he had been freed from jail.

Dark had the worst childhood imaginable. His father was a priest, his mother was a whore. He had grown up with his mom at her brothel, and he had been the only child there. The whores had all really been mothers to him, and he had grown up in the worst part of Radasath. From there he began to dip into the criminal arts, starting off as a pickpocket, then he started going farther and farther down the criminal road.

Unfortunately he got caught in a lords house, then his father, father Mercoulli stepped in, in exchange for one thing, Dark had to do something good. Dark grudgingly agreed, so his father went and talked the lord into not pressing charges. So here he was, bored as hell sitting in a carriage pulling into some rural little town with his bastard father and a cat, his life sucked. Perhaps the one good thing was that it stopped raining.

To the guards in town the duo looked strange. A priest who looked like he had never spent a day hungry in his life, and the thin and pale vampire of a boy. To Jaliss, the head of the town watch, this boy looked like trouble. Perhaps it was his long black hair concealing his eyes, or the sly smile he carried arrogantly on his face. Something was wrong with that boy.

"Father Mercoulli we meet again" the captain of the town guard said bowing slightly. He straightened up and turned to Dark. "Who might this be?" he asked in a careful tone. If it was too hostile he might offend the Priest, but if it was to gentle he might risk offending the young man, Jaliss was unsure who he was afraid of more. The mighty priest with royal connectons, or the mysterious vampire boy.

"This is my son," Father Mercoulli stated, both Jaliss and Dark cringed at the hostile way he said son, as if it was some insult. "He has taken to a life of crime, I plan to straighten him out by leaving him in your presence." the Father continued. Jaliss turned a dark shade of red, the Father knew he hated criminals, yet he brought a known criminal to Underwood! This would not stand! "Absolutely not!" Jaliss hissed. The Father looked insulted, "But my son is here to turn a new leaf." he replied. "I don't care if he turns every leaf in his tree he won't run free unattended!" replied the captain angrily.

The Father began to look furious, and Dark allowed a slight smirk crawl onto his face. Serves you right you Bastard! he thought to himself wickedly. He heard his father say something about a wedding, and then he looked up. At this point a rather large crowd was watching. The most noteworthy person he saw was a man in a white coat thing and dark colored trousers. Due to his clothes was obvious he was not endemic to Underwood. His hair was about the same length as Dark's, but it was lighter. His eyes were teal, and his skin a light tan.

It appeared he was watching the argument with great interest. "It appears you two are being watched." he muttered quietly. The two turned to see the new man. "You there you need some work?" the Father asked the stranger. He saw the man pause. Then he heard the man reply, "What do you have in mind?"

[Chroma the lost]

What do you have in mind?
Five words that changed Chroma's Life forever. The father smile got bigger. I'll give you 200 gold to watch my son here, he needs to do a good deed within eight days. If he does you will be given a bonus, if he doesn't I want you to escort him back to Rasadath and turn him in to the jail house." Chroma paused, the job sounded easy, just watch some kid.

Dark stared daggers at the him, but it didn't register on Chroma's face. The priest smiled and pulled his purse out, then noticed the man had no purse. So he pulled out a brown bag and deposited two hundred gold coins before tossing it to Chroma. Jaliss opened his mouth to say something, then shut it. then the Baby sitter and his charge left, "I recommend the peaceful promenade" the father called out after them.

Chroma tossed the pouch full of gold up and down. Several people passed by as they passed a few house on the way to the bar. "The jingle of gold is nice ain't it." his charge commented in an urban accent. "Ya know I never caught your name" he continued. Chroma smiled, "My Father calls me E10, you can call me Chroma." his charge paused, stunned by the way his babysitters father referred to him. Then kept moving, "My name is Dark silence" the charge replied, "Just call me Dark though."

The two kept moving, passing more people, and several houses marked as plague holders. Eventually they found their way to the
Peaceful Promenade for a place to stay the night, after getting a room the two sat down and ordered food. Dark got a platter of meat, Chroma had no idea what to get, so he simply got whatever Dark was getting. Dark ravenously wolfed his food down while Chroma ate small pieces and chewed slowly.

The meal tasted adequate, probably because he had never eaten anything like it before. The entire time between Dark finishing his plate and Chroma finishing his food was awkward. Dark spent the whole time looking at Chroma strangely. It was odd, to Dark, Chroma looked human, but for some reason he knew Chroma wasn't human. In fact Chroma was like some sort of Robot thing. It was probably just the awkward way he carried himself and how he spoke. It was probably just paranoia, but he felt like he couldn't trust Chroma.

[Break the silence]

After they finished eating dinner the two went up to their room, a simple small room, on the upper floor of the Bar and had two beds, one touching the wall to the left, and one touching the wall to the right. Between them was a small dresser with a candle on it. Only three paces distance separated the two beds, and their was little room to walk. The two ignored each other, and retired for the night.


Powering down.......


At dawns first light Chroma woke up feeling weird, as if he had a dream and forgot it. Which was illogical because he had powered down. As he sat up he noticed two things, his room had a window, and light was streaming through, revealing all of the dust that was in the air. Then he noticed the furry feline that Dark had been carrying under his coat. It was staring at him intently. Chroma took this time to study the creature. It was small, about big enough to fit on Chroma's hand. It was covered in soft black fur that shined in the sunlight. The cat mewled and tried to jump from Dark's bed to Chroma's, apparently cats could not defy gravity, because it landed and fell over, the thud caused Dark to wake up.

He turned his head and made a quick airy noise several times before Chroma realized what he was doing. As Dark tsked the cat turned and looked at him. "Here Train." he called softly, this confused Chroma. Who was Train, then he watched the cat scamper over to him. "Is the cats codename train?" he asked Dark. Dark looked up at him confused. "What? no that's his name, train." Chroma looked confused. "What did you mean your father called you E10?" asked Dark standing up.

Chroma looked confused. "I am an Emoticon, artificial life. To be precise I am the tenth emoticon, hence E10." Chroma replied. Dark looked amazed, "Holy Hell." he said sitting back down. "Dude... that's weird, how long have you.....Emoticons been around?" he asked curiously leaning forward. "I was made about two million of your years ago, but my creators have long since left Althanas." there was an awkward silence for a moment, and then Dark stood up. "Well, the total cost of staying here for eight days is 100 gold, I'll pay 50, and you can cover the other half, then we need to get you some new clothes, because that white cloak is just weird, after that, we will start looking for something good for me to do." Dark said obviously changing the topic. The two nodded and left the room in search of the bartender to pay their next few days in advance.

[Chroma the lost]

After paying the bartender the two went of in search of a store. Instead they found a bakery and bought a few rolls to eat now and snack on later. Then the nice young lady at the bakery named Willow pointed them to the general store. Dark smiled and winked at her, the the scary Baker chased them both off with a rolling pin. Dark ran back in and dropped the coins on the counter paying for the rolls and then ran out on his way to the general store. Once there Dark checked his purse and Chroma's purse. "Okay altogether we have 350 gold coins left. Lets buy you a cheap new cloak and use the rest to fund our plans in the future."

Once inside the General store Chroma realized Train was riding inside the pocket of Dark's jacket. The cat noticed him staring and mewed annoyed. "It's impolite to stare." Dark said trying to hold a straight face. Chroma quickly opened up a new file and titled it Manners.

Editing File [Manners]
1. It is rude to stare
he quickly saved and shut the program down as the shop keeper approached them. He was a tall man, burly and slightly tan. He had a large bushy beard, and smelled of peppermints. His nose jutted out like a beak, and his eyes were white and foggy. Dark smiled and asked, "Sorry to bother ya but do you have any traveling cloaks in this fellows size?" Then Dark realized the man was blind. He then added "He's about XXL" The shop keeper smiled, "Your in luck I do happen to have one" he turned and went to a back room returning with a large cloak. "That will be 25 gold." Dark looked pleasantly surprised and looked around, eventually grabbing a ball of black yarn, the man grabbed it and felt the tag. "In total that shall be 30 gold" he replied and yawned. Dark pulled the coins out and payed. then the two went off to see if any help was needed around the town.

[Break the silence]

The pair stood in the main plaza in front of city hall. The City Hall was a large wooden building, to Dark it was plain and boring, but Chroma was enthralled by it's "Beauty". dark couldn't wait until Chroma saw a real city for the first time. Nothing looked inherently wrong around the plaza, but their was a strange aura about the town, as if there was something hiding in every corner. The feeling was eerie.

Of course the job board was full of jobs, and Dark was interested in several jobs. But it appeared Mr. Roboto was more interested in observing other people. Several times he caught Chroma looking at kids from the orphanage play, or groups of women gossiping. After an hour of waffling Dark decided on a job and grabbed it off the board. Something made the hair on the back of his neck rise, he turned and there was Jaliss, staring him down. Dark shivered and turned to Chroma. "Perhaps we should go" Dark suggested looking over a few jobs. One was a simple matter of locating a lost cat, the other was a lot different, and would take a bit of planning.

Dark turned to look at Chroma, and the AI was gone. Dark turned and looked around frantically, if Jaliss caught Dark without Chroma he was done for! "Chroma?" he called out, no reply. he swore under his breath and ran towards Jaliss, who had still been watching him. "Excuse me Jaliss? I noticed you were eying me like a hawk, did you happen to see where my chaperon went?" he asked curiously. He then heard a bunch of cheers and turned around. There was Chroma fishing some kid's kite out of a tree. "It appears mister Chroma has a heart of Gold" Jaliss commented smirking. Dark sighed and watched the AI return the young boys kite to him. He does have a heart of gold... Dark thought to himself as he watched the child's face light up.

A few other children ran up, a strange mix of boys and girls, most of which Dark assumed were from the Orphanage due to their somewhat worn down clothes. Soon they were playing tag with Chroma, strangely Chroma knew the rules, the Dark thought back to when he was looking at jobs. Chroma had been watching a group of kids playing earlier, he racked his brain and thought about what they had been playing. Could it have been tag, if so could Chroma learned to play tag by simply watching them? The thoughts swam through his mind until he came to one conclusion. Chroma was amazing.

Unfortunately for Dark and the rest of his plans for the day Chroma kept playing with the kids until they were all called back for dinner, and one very tired AI found Dark sitting on a bench. It was strange, the AI had a wild grin on his face and was panting heavily as he sat down. "That was fun!" Chroma said still grinning. Then he paused, what is fun? he asked himself. Dark snapped his fingers in front of the AI's face to gain his attention. "Earth to Metal man." he said looking annoyed, "Are you hungry?" he asked holding up a bun. Chroma instantly snatched it and wolfed it down. "It's getting late let's head back to the Inn and have dinner. Dark said standing up. Chroma agreed and stood up as well.

[Chroma the lost]

The streets of Underwood were empty as the pair walked back to the Peaceful Promenade, but not silent. The entire time Dark listened to Chroma tell him about the great time he had playing with the kids. By the time he had finished his tale they had arrived back at the bar. As they walked in Dark immediately knew something was wrong. The whole bar was dead silent. Chroma picked up the vibe and the two looked at each other. Go see whats up in the rest of the bar, I'll go get my swords Dark mouthed to Chroma. Before he went he took Train from his pocket and handed it to Chroma. "It'll make you look less threatening" Dark muttered softly, and then he nimbly shot up the stairs.

Chroma took a deep breath and tip-toed over to the corner of the hall, to the right would be the actual Bar and it's table. He could hear something, the soft snoring of a large beast, he peeked his head around. Sleeping in the center of the Tavern was a large beast, manlike in shape. It's skin was a poisonous purple, and was stretched tightly over gigantic muscles. It's hands and feet ended with sharp talons and claws, and two large blade like tusks jutted out of its mouth. The only thing covering it was a battered loincloth, and even then it wasn't doing much good. Covering behind the bar were several customers. Chroma paused, why had they not attempted to leave? he wondered. Then the answer was spotted upon further observation.

The floor was littered with broken shards of glass, which Chroma hypothesized would make a loud crunch if stepped on. The situation was bad, Chroma did not need his logic sensors to know that, now all he needed to do was wait for Dark, he would know what to do.

[Break the silence]

Dark flitted cautiously across the empty hallway on the second floor of the Bar, stopping at his room first. He lifted the mattress on his bed and pulled two Iron long swords he had hidden there the night before. After he was armed he searched the rest of the rooms, picking locks if he needed to. Every room was exactly the same as the others, empty and devoid of all life. He found nothing, so he quickly and silently darted down the stairs.

He didn't hear any fights, so he simply walked up to Chroma. "Nothing upstairs" he said in a regularly normal tone. Chroma cringed, the Dark heard what he thought was the grinding of two boulders stop. He peered around the corner and saw the groggy giant rise from the floor. It was not happy to be woken up. It turned and looked at Chroma and Dark, and bellowed furiously, snot flying from its moist nose, and then it charged.

"SPLIT UP!" Dark shouted at Chroma as he leaped to the right, landing in a roll. Chroma mimicked the action, heading to the left instead. The beast sailed past both, crashing against the wall. Chroma turned to see Dark throw one of the swords to him, he caught it and cringed as he realized he still had Train. "Dark!" he called out in a panic. "What do I do with Train?" he asked. Dark swore and looked around. The cat mewled in protest at the sudden movements.

The bartender poked his head over the counter of the bar and held out a hand, "I'll hold it" he called out. Chroma scratched the cat behind the ears, "Sorry 'bout this" he said, and tossed Train across the room to the bartender. Just in time because the Beast leaped back into the room howling at the two would-be heroes. "Whats the plan?" asked Chroma brandishing his sword menacingly. "Stab the hell out of it!" Dark shouted back. Chroma didn't need logic sensors to see it was a bad plan.

The beast roared and charged at Dark, who nimbly leaped out of the way, slashing at the beasts left calf. The monster screeched in agony and swung it's left fist cuffing Dark. He grunted and flew several feet back. Luckily dark caught him, his boots crunching on the broken glass. "Dark what the hell is this thing?" he asked setting him down. "Looks like an ogre, male, possibly rabid or insane." Dark replied. Both gulped as the thing turned to face them again, black blood oozing from the gash on it's left leg. It roared again, and charged.

[Chroma the lost]

Chroma and Dark barrel rolled again to avoid the next charge. "Any new plans?" Chroma asked as the back pedaled to make more room between them and the beast. Then it threw a table at them. To Dark it was if the Table flew in slow motion, "SHIT!" The duo shouted as they rolled out of the way yet again. The table crashed to the ground with a loud crack and continued to slide until slamming against the wall.

Then the beast was on Dark, it pinned him down with one foot and roared in victory. For the moment it had forgotten about Chroma, it had one foe down. It raised one mighty fist in the air, ready to bring it down and smash Dark's brains out. It grinned, revealing several rows of jagged, ugly, sharp teeth. Blood continued to ooze from the slash on it's left calf.

Chroma kicked a table, causing it to slide towards the beast. It scraped noisily approaching the beast, but it was to busy reveling to notice. Chroma ran and leaped onto the table, leaping again as it got close to the beast, landing on it's back. The beast stopped and looked up at Chroma, it opened it's mouth to roar, and Chroma crudely stabbed his sword down it's throat killing it. It began to sway, and then fell backwards onto the table, crushing it.

Dark sat up gingerly and stared at his companion, who had been thrown off and was now sprawled on the floor unconscious. "We did it" he said breathlessly. "We did it!" He shouted smiling. He ran over to Chroma and rolled the AI over, slapping him mercilessly until he woke up. "Chroma we killed it!" he said in a celebratory tone. "Actually, more like you did it but still." he added.

Several customers rose from behind the bar and walked over to the corpse of the mighty being. Then one person clapped, Dark turned to see Jaliss standing in the hallway, a smirk plastered over his face. "Perhaps there is an explanation owed." he said walking forward.

[Break the silence]

Jaliss chuckled, "Tell me, such a beast is much too big to fit through the door. How do you think it got in?" he asked taking several steps forward. His dark green eyes glittering in the small amount of sunlight that leaked through the windows of the Tavern. "I thought it busted a hole in the wall." Dark replied. Jaliss spread out his arms and turned in a circle gesturing to the whole room. "Where is said hole?" he asked.

Dark turned stunned. Jaliss was right, there was no hole. "This was all a test" Jaliss said smiling. "You should be happy to know no one was in any real danger. All of the so called 'hostages' were highly trained town guards. We drugged the ogre and brought it in here for you to fight. Would you like to know why?" Jallis asked. Dark gulped.

"I sense both of you have a great adventure ahead of you. In fact I almost know you do. An adventure together, this was my test to see if you could make it. I wanted to see how you both worked together, how you would react to this type of situation. You both passed with flying colors." Both Dark and Chroma stood in shock. Who was Jaliss really? how was he able to subdue an Ogre? All of these questions roiled inside of Dark's mind, but nothing could escape the steel trap in his mind. "Perhaps we shall continue this over supper. Chroma return to your room and rest. Dark we have a medic here to address any wounds."

[Chroma the lost]

Chroma sat up in his room playing with Train for two hours while he waited. Apparently the cat was still angry about being tossed. "Come on Train it was that or you'd get rolled around as I fought the thing." he said petting the cat. It mewled annoyed, as if to say, You Threw me! It continued like that for roughly two hours, then Dark came back up.

"So how bad was it?" Chroma asked his rogue charge. "I had two cracked ribs and one full blown Break. Good thing for me that there are some great healers here or else I'd be down for the count on the good deed race. Now all that is left is a slightly bruised rib that will fade away in a few days." Dark replied. Both had a million things on their mind, but it was long past sunset and had been a long day.

Neither Dark or Chroma had any energy left, the last pumps of Adrenaline draining from their systems. With a thud Chroma was asleep on is bed. With Another Dark passed out, it appeared answers could wait until morning.

[Break the silence]

Spoils:
Two vials of ogre blood. One for Chroma and One for Dark

[Revenant]

Full rubric, full commentary requested. Yes it is still bunnying if both accounts are your character, but approval to do so is assumed at that point.

STORY

Continuity (4) – I have no questions on why Dark is involved with this thread, his back story, or what he is doing. Having read Chroma’s thread which leads directly into this one, I understand what his character is about. For an outside observer however, someone who hasn’t read Chroma’s intro thread, there isn’t much here describing what he is doing here or what his motivations are. Every thread you write with a character doesn’t have to reference the character’s complete history and back story, but you need to write enough to let casual readers know who they are reading about and why the characters are where they are and are doing what they are doing.

Setting (3) – You really don’t have much to go by here. The two characters (presumably some time far in the future) are in a tavern. That’s it. What does the tavern look like? Then you flashback to a carriage. What does it look like inside? What does the view look outside as you are travelling? I understand where your characters are location-wise, but I have no feel for the place. You need to be more vivid and descriptive to get a higher score. Really work to bring your story to life.

Pacing (4) – While each post follows one another pretty well, the overall pace of the story jumps around a lot. Most significantly, you wake up grab some rolls and other supplies, then look at the jobs board / play with the kids for a couple of hours, and then it’s dark. That was a huge time lapse. Pay attention to the overall flow of your threads.

CHARACTER

Dialogue (4) – Frankly, most of the dialogue in this story is flat and uninspired. Some of the lines, like
”It appears you two are being watched.” are too formal and don’t match the character that is speaking. When writing dialogue, try to get into the mindset of the character in question and then talk as a normal person would talk, only from their point of view. As a young hooligan, I wouldn’t expect Dark to say, “It appears you two are being watched.” I would expect him to say something like, “You idiots realize that everyone’s staring at us, right?”

Action (3) – Action is more than just fighting, and while your fight with the ogre wasn’t bad, there were a lot of other action which just didn’t feel in tune with your characters, specifically Dark. Again, from your description and back story, I got the impression that Dark was a frustrated, emotional delinquent, but his actions really made him seem more like a standard adventurer. While the brooding, angst-filled youth is a cliché, it has far more personality than a cookie-cutter, “need work, let’s check the job board” adventurer. Like dialogue, try to get into a character’s mind and think of how they would act and react to any given situation. This gets easier with time as you come to know your character more. As far as your fight scene goes I only saw one big abnormality, which was when Chroma kicks the table and then jumps onto the moving table and then onto the ogre’s back. This would be fine if he were to jump on the table after it had stopped next to the ogre, or if he had kicked run after the moving table before he jumped on it, but the wording you used had him jumping onto the table from a standing still position while the table was in motion, a wholly unrealistic and unbelievable action.

Persona (2) – Aside from the aforementioned dark not behaving in accordance with the character info portrayed, I had to shake my head at the way you used the NPC Jaliss. Not only was the “surprise, it was a test” response utterly cliché, but it came out of nowhere. One moment you have Jaliss refusing to even have Dark in his town and glaring daggers at the boy, the next moment he’s treating them as if he’s known that Dark was the prophesied one all along. There is no hint that Jaliss has anything but the upmost scorn for Dark. Remember that writing how NPCs do things is just as important as writing how your characters do things, and can be harder since with an NPC you don’t have an established character to write off of.

WRITING STYLE

Technique (3) – Like I said, the whole “surprise, it was a test” twist ending was not only incredibly cliché, it was executed rather poorly.

Mechanics (3) – You really need to work on writing with correct spelling and punctuation. Being poor in these areas can make an otherwise normal story seem really bad.

Clarity (5) – I had to reread the fight with the ogre to make sure I understood how everything was going down. Making combat fluid, exciting, and understandable can be difficult, so I would recommend taking your time to reread those areas and then read them out loud to make sure everything makes sense.

WILD CARD

Wild Card (3)

TOTAL: 34

Not the best score ever, but you’ve improved since your “Powering Up” thread. Continue to write and I’m sure your scores will continue to improve as well. If you have any questions, feel free to PM me or contact me via AIM (screenname: darkspyrchylde).

Break the silence receives 200 exp and 55 gp.
Chroma the lost receives 200 exp and 55 gp.

Both characters receive a vial of ogre blood (creepy as that is) as requested.

[Taskmienster]

Gp and Exp Added.