The familiarity of the ship was heartwarming in the least. Exaltare ran his fingers across small electronics and metal walls, feeling completely at home in a ship he had aided in building. In his eyes, it was a masterpiece of a ship. He carefully watched Nein take his place and the small curve form on his lips and chuckled, walking further into the ship. He made his way straight to the engine room for one last check that everything was in proper working order. It would just sort of kinda suck if they all ended up dying because an engine blew up. Just a little.

Althalia's voice rang out over the PA system and the advice to quickly strap himself to a seat or bunk sounded marvelous. He'd heard all the rumors about Althalia's flying and he didn't quite want to risk them being false just yet. He looked around the room and the lack of seats or bunks and groaned. He grabbed the nearest pillar and wrapped his long limbs around it.

When the ship took off he and the pole became best of friends.

Althalia's voice pulled him out of the wide eyed, panicked stupor. He was wrapped around the pillar like a rope, hanging onto dear life. His feathers were fluffed and the bird man looked twice his size at the moment. Like a giant ball of feathers glued to a pillar. He peeled himself off, his feet touching carefully to the ground.

"Note to self, stay in the bridge for take offs. Where there are seats. And seat belts," he murmured silently to himself, sliding his goggled up over his eyes and walking shakily around the room, checking every piece of the engines. He was sure working would help him find his space legs He hoped so. He was starting to feel a little queasy...

Current Location: The Ladybird

---Distracted by his exceedingly important task of following the pattern of blinking lights on his chair, Tsukiya barely had time to look up from his task to greet his Captain with a hearty grin and wave. He had important business to attend to though, he didn't know exactly what it was that he was accomplishing, but it had to be something important given how bright and flashy the buttons he was pressing were though. As Athalia took her place at the helm of the ship and began preparations for launch a small message appeared on his console, indicating a job well done for the Vice Captain. With his job complete he laid back in his chair for a moment as Athalia's voice resonated throughout the ship.

---"Alright gang, all cargo and crew are on board and accounted for, and HQ has given us the green light. Strap yourselves into the nearest seat or bunk - might get a little turbulent, but nothing to worry dudes - normal stuff! Initiating launch sequence in twenty seconds!" While any sane person would have taken this as a warning to sit down, buckle up, and pray for their survival, as a leader of 6-VZ he was by no means 'sane'. Rather, he began bouncing around in his seat in preparation for launch. "... three... two... one... Launch!" Too excited to contain himself at the thought of their mission any longer, the tiny Keeper lept out of his seat as the ship hurdled itself forward, throwing his hands up in celebration. "Haha, adventure!"

---With the wild acceleration of the ship his voice was almost completely drowned out by the roar of the engine, the other crew too preoccupied with holding on for dear life to notice the Lyn vanish from his seat. As the ship finished its entry into the Lifestream an air of relief filled the cabin, word had been true for the Captain as well, it was going to be a miracle if they made it to the planet in one piece, let alone survive a mission. Going over the readings on their screens, it became apparent there was a disturbing lack of noise coming from the Vice Captain, nervous glances shot around the room to try and figure out what he was up to, the awkward silence only broken as Athalia's voice rang out through the ship.

---"Y'all are clear to move about the ship, y'know, if you want. Get to know your fellow team and crew members. Or grab a bite. Sleep. That's cool too~! Feel free to shoot me a message or come up to the bridge if you want or need to. Other than that, make yourselves comfortable! Captain Saloshin, out!" Eyes were drawn to the tiny Keeper as he wedged himself free of the wall behind his chair, apparently having crashed into it at some point during the liftoff. "Woooo, that was awesome!" Dusting himself off, he seemed completely unphased by the impact he just endured, despite the small crater left in the wall by his impact. Smiling he scurried off towards the door leading out of the room, turning back to give an exaggerated wave to Nein and Athalia. "I'm going to make sure none of the noobies died, just yell if you need me to take over for a bit~"

---With a dumb grin plastered across his face he disappeared around the corner, off to harass the new recruits unfortunate enough to not have died while they were hurtling through the atmosphere. Before reaching any of their rooms, he stopped by his room and peaked inside, kind of disappointed to find his room void of any belongings other than his own, kind of hoping at least one of the recruits wouldn't kick him out of their room so he could spend the night with them. Not wasting any more time, he began prowling the halls for any recruits that had recovered enough to try navigating out of their room, but there appeared to be no sign of life aside from the occasional death groan from various places on the ship, his ears drooping slightly as he grew more depressed.

---As he started reaching the rooms closer to the back his ears perked up, noticing the smoke trailing out of an open room. Rushing over to the door he peeked inside to confirm his suspicion, his face lighting up as he noticed the gruff cowboy reclining in one of the bunks, it looked like the old man had survived the take-off after all. Scurrying in on all fours the Lyn crawled up to the side of his bunk, peeking over the side to stare at Phil expectantly with his mouth open in a dumb grim, his tail wagging excitedly behind him. He knew Phil would eventually have to stop drinking or smoking and notice him, it was just a matter of waiting until he ran out of either, this was always such a fun game~  

Exaltare finished his check of the engines and looked around the room, looking genuinely excited. He was in a giant machine, flying through space and shit, and now longer felt sick to his stomach. He could tinker and build and make friends to his heart's desire. This would be so frick fracken cool. Now just to find his room and his roommate, become best friends, and hope he got the top bunk.

He started walking, mentally cataloging everything as he made his way through the large ship. He stopped when he found the cargo bay and looked around like a kid about to steal a cookie from the cookie jar before searching for a box that may contain a snack. Hopefully nuts. Nuts would be so appetizing at the moment. He looked up and squeaked, his small beady eyes going wide in excitement. Jezebel. He looked back at the box he was pretty sure contained the snack he wanted, then hurry over to the mechanical horse.

"Gosh you're real pretty you know that?" He ran his hands along her side, clicking his beak as he looked back at the door. He really, really wanted to know what made her tick but he was pretty sure if he did anything to her, the cowboy would be having roast bird for dinner. "Oh boy you're just a marvel though," he murmured softly as he looked her over. "You're all metal but I can't see any visible wires or battery placements or anything..." He bit his lower lip and patted Jezebel's shoulder. "Maybe if I find the cowboy and ask him..." He clicked his beak and nodded before hurrying off down the halls. Surely the man wouldn't keep him from examining such a mechanical mystery, would he?

He came to a skidding halt when he saw the faun girl and the vice captain in a room with the cowboy man and grinned from ear to ear. Jackpot. "Can I research your horse? For science." He bounced from foot to foot then looked at the other two. "Hi."

The dead do not move quickly. Well, at least those that do not want to eat your face and turn you into a monster—they are not good company. Brains found that he could not move at all, even when he knew he may be late for his departure. World-ships do not wait for zombies to finish holding hands.

“Promise that you’ll come back to me.”

“Hey, we survived S.A.R.—what’s the worst that could happen?”

“You idiot, you’re never supposed to say that… promise me.”

Brains paused. He didn’t know what to say—a soft lie. “I promise to come back.” He hoped he would, but he didn’t know. Brains kissed him and left before he could change his mind.

--- (T_T) ---

The dead do not move quickly, especially when the wonders of a vast cosmos swimming with life shatter in front of your very eyes. Brains slowly shivered as stuttering awe crept into his veins, staring agape at the majesty of the world-ship and the backflipping infinity of towers and the people—the people!

Such a dazzling variety of freshes! Feather-people, scaly-people, eight-floppy-legged-people, flying-people, crawling-people, spiky-people, they all bled fascinating—how did they work? What made them tick, how did their vital functions keep them functioning? Necropsies were a last resort.

He started walking—(excuse me) shambling—towards his destination (“Tower C, Dock 9”), resisting his natural urge to gawk at every new creature. A lot of them were not so polite, though. People gaped at him—his desiccated, mottled grey flesh, his lacerated cheek and the tattooed bones squirming underneath.

Brains did not think that he was so interesting. The word had been getting out about his world—they were calling it “Hades” after some old human myth—and his people were integrating as they could. Lichyard pinged somewhere dark and deep, and he closed the door on it before anger settled in.

Surely, these living people could not be like that. Brains had to admit that they were strange: they paid the exorbitant fee to travel to his world, searching for loved ones. The mummies were hesitant to tell these death-tourists otherwise because the roads had never been in such a good state of repair.

It tickled Brains to learn that some of the surplus funding had gone to updating the curricular system as well—the liches were uncomfortable with the outsiders questioning the medical magic. “Well, they can rot.” He muttered, stepping into an ‘elevator,’ a contraption that never failed to confuse him.

He watched as others entered the same elevator—“would someone press the… uh, ‘buh-tonne’ for… rot, uh, Dock 9?” A male human looked up from his handheld device with an initially friendly expression, blanched quite suddenly, and hit (Brains hoped) the right ‘buh-tonne’ with his fist.

“You don’t smell.” Brains looked down at a little spiky-person.

His mother gasped—whether it was at the child’s comment or his face, Brains could not tell—“I am so sorry—!” He waved it off, the stitching at his wrist flopping with his movements.

“Don’t worry about it,” Brains croaked, the last word rattling. He knelt down to be on its level. The child retreated behind its mother’s leg, and she stiffened too. The others in the elevator watched suspiciously. Brains sniffed. “You don’t smell either. I don’t think you and I are so different.”

He held out his more complete hand—he tucked the eroded fingers of his left hand behind his back. The child looked up at its mother. After a moment, she nodded. “You’re the bravest little one I have met yet,” Brains smiled as the child extended its hand. He gently took its hand and squeezed it.

“It’s nice to meet you.” He was careful not to say eat you because freshes were so weird about that—‘cannibalism,’ bah! He ran his thumb over the back of the child’s hand. Brains loved how living flesh felt. His own was cold, unresponsive and probably clammy—the child’s pulsed with life, warmth.

The child ripped its hand away and cowered in mother’s skirts. Brains rose to his full height. “I didn’t mean to scare your child… uh—is ‘madam’ right?” She nodded, trying to keep her jaw from dropping open. The aura in the elevator was oppressive. He could feel their apprehension pressing him down.

The male human who had hit the button turned to say something, but a voice crooned overhead: “TOWER C, DECK 9. ALL PASSENGERS BOUND FOR CLASS-M WORLDSHIP LADYBIRD, BE AWARE THAT IT WILL DEPART SHORTLY. FINAL LAUNCH PROCEDURES ARE UNDERWAY.”

“Oh, that’s me!” Brains clicked, shouldering his backpack and politely sliding through the bodies in the elevator. He stepped out of the elevator and started following the glowing signs on the floor, but not before he heard—“how come they let a damn zombie into the Keepers?” and the doors closed.

--- (>.>) ---

Brains had to convince the docking operative that he was a crewmember. The operative was convinced that it was a clerical error that a corpse had been signed to serve with the keepers, but Brains would have none of that. He had been dealing with this nonsense all day.

He shoved the docking operative aside and stumbled onboard. When the operative followed him, demanding that he disembark, Brains lunged at him. The man fled, screaming for security. Brains relocated his jaw and opened the hatchway deeper into The Ladybird. He wished that he had handled that better.

Brains wished that the docking operative had handled it better. He pushed the thought aside. “Let ‘im rot.” As he walked through the chromed, sleek hallways, he saw numerous people walking—no, running—to and fro. A moldy eyebrow shot towards what was left of his hairline. Brains reached out and grabbed one of them.

She shrieked when she saw his face. “Hey, that’s not nice!” This was ridiculous—was everyone out to hurt his feelings or insult him today? Her expression genuinely hurt him! She stared.

“Holy shit, you can talk?” Now it was Brains’s turn to stare.

How…? “Yes.” He said, curtly. “Why is everyone running around?”

“You can talk, but you can’t hear? Captain Saloshin has ordered everyone to buckle—” She never got to finish her sentence. The ship jolted forward like a startled thestral. She crashed into Brains and they tumbled down a long hallway as the ship accelerated beyond physically possible speeds.

They slammed into a wall. A giant, cruel hand was trying to force their atoms to comingle with the bulkhead’s atoms. Brains absorbed most of the impact, but the girl cracked her head against the bulkhead. When the G-forces subsided and The Ladybird reached ‘cruising speed,’ she did not move.

Brains rolled her off of him. He probed the posterior skull and his fingers came back bloody. He checked her pulse--thready. Her breath? Shallow. Her pupils did not respond when he shined light into them. “Rot.” He cursed. He was stowing his tools when he heard footsteps. Brains took a sharp breath.

A man rounded the corner and saw them. He stumbled; hand darting to cover his mouth, but Brains cut him off right there: “Tell me where the rotting medical bay is!” He pointed down the hallway. “Help me, you idiot!” Sufficiently cowed, the crewman rushed over and helped Brains .

As they carried her into the medical bay, Brains and the crewman set her on a table. The Ladybird’s medical staff rushed in and tried to take over the procedure. Brains growled at them. “You want to help her? Help me.” If he did one good thing today, he would help this woman.

“You there,” he said to the original crewman as he snapped on a pair of nitrile gloves. The young man froze in place. “Your name?” He gulped and turned. This damn zombie had no right to order him around—he was a stowaway for Khan’s sake!—but he feared him all the same. He could eat all their brains.

“Malcolm, sir. Mycroft Malcolm.” The zombie grinned—far too many teeth for his liking and groaned with his grave-touched voice.

“Congratulations, Malcolm. You’re my new assistant.”

--- D:< ---

Fact of 1st Post: Hades uses shambler bones as currency. A knuckle is the equivalent of a dime.

It felt nice to finally get some peace and quiet. Lips quirking a little Phil reached inside his coat with his free hand and drew out his flask, taking a long swig, capping it right before he heard something that sounded suspiciously like the pitter patter of tiny Tsukiya feet. Heaving a sigh Phil tugged his hat down over his eyes and took a long drag of his cigarette, exhaling slowly. He could practically feel Tsukiya’s tiny little eyes boring into the side of his face and, finally, he turned his head slightly and lifted his free hand to push his hat out of the way of one of his eyes, giving him enough room to peer at the small vice captain.

“Heya Tsuk---” Phil suddenly sat straight up when there was a loud clattering, nearly dropping his cigarette, only to frown down at the new recruit. “Uh…”

How in the hell had a new recruit found him anyways? His smoking was noticeable but one would have had to have come clear across the ship in order to find him. His eyes narrowed suspiciously and he was about to ask the faun that had somehow managed to find her despite her obvious clumsiness why the hell she was in his room, when, suddenly, the bipedal chicken had joined them.

Phil looked from Tsukiya, to Isi, then to Ex, his eyebrow twitching a little in annoyance; how the hell were these people finding him? “You… Want to… Research my horse…?”

That was when yet another visitor decided to grace them with his presence. To this particular team member’s credit he seemed just about as enthused as Phil was to be in that room, possibly even less enthused, honestly. He watched him about face and nearly lose his arm to his door as it slid shut with a quiet hiss, leaving them all locked in. Phil stared at the door for a long moment, his gaze panning over all the occupants of the room, before he sighed heavily.

“I’m not fucking drunk enough for this.” he muttered, reaching inside his coat and pulling out his flask, tipping his head back and emptying it.

Phil had just finished stubbing out the remnants of his cigarette on the wall and emptying his flask when his comm crackled to life. He frowned, wondering what the hell else could possibly go wrong when he heard the strained voice of the timid newbie that they’d met shortly before on the dock. As she stammered he let out a slow sigh and reached back inside his coat for his cigarettes.

"Oh guh-god... z-zombie in the m-muh-medbay... I-I repeat... zombie in th-the med-b-buh-bay. We're so-so-so f-fuh-fucked."

Without looking up from the new cigarette that he’d placed between his lips he addressed their Vice Captain. “This is gonna be a long ass trip.”

---

Once Nein felt the lock to the door click into place he felt his lips quirk. It wasn’t often that he was able to abuse his abilities and, well, keeping the crew in one place so they didn’t injure themselves was noble and good practice. Besides, he was certain that they would value from each others’ company… Maybe. That was how things worked on organic planets, wasn’t it? Lock people in a room together in order for them to get along? He thought he’d read that in a book somewhere.

With a contemplative hum, Nein continued to adjust their course while simultaneously attempting to research just where he’d heard of that particular piece of organic culture. Unfortunately most of what he seemed to be turning up seemed to be some sort of strange mating ritual amongst male organics and that… Was definitely not what he had intended. That was definitely not something he wanted filtering through the speakers all over the ship but, unfortunately, he didn’t really have a chance to rectify.

"Oh guh-god... z-zombie in the m-muh-medbay... I-I repeat... zombie in th-the med-b-buh-bay. We're so-so-so f-fuh-fucked."

Nein’s back immediately went rigid at mention of the undead, his eyes going wide and his hair slowly beginning to stand on end in alarm. How many near-death scares could they possibly have in such a short jump. Hesitantly Nein slowly looked over at their captain, hoping he didn’t look nearly as alarmed as he suddenly felt; animated corpses? On a keeper ship? Why him? Why now?

“C-Captain… H-how would you like to… Proceed?” he questioned, hesitantly, hoping the answer wasn’t to send Nein down to the medbay to check things out; Nein couldn’t handle such things.

It took Isi a few moments to register what was going on. She slowly stood up and looked at the people in the room, ears flickering with curiosity. She had seen these people board the ship but seeing them up close was different.

There was one who looked like a small human child crossed with a fox of some sort, an old man who looked very grouchy, a very very tall bird man, and another grouchy looking man. She turned to the bird man and smiled brightly at him. "Hello!" she figured if they were all locked in the room together she might as well get to know them.

When Acira was heard over the speakers Isi made a face. She barely managed to jump out of the way as Tsukiya ran at the door and tore it out of the frame. She blinked a few times, completely thrown off by how strong the small creature was.

She stood there for another moment, thinking hard.

"...What's a zombie?"

Remember how I said that the dead do not move quickly? I am pretty sure that you do, considering that this is the third time that I have written the phrase—I was not lying. Practiced hands set to work, palpating the crewmember’s head wound, beckoning for a scanner, not receiving it, their owner demanding said scanner, finally receiving it and determining that the crewmember’s brain, miraculously, had not swollen.

The rest of the procedure should have gone by easily: stitches, bandages, minor painkiller regime and bed rest. Like everything else today, it did not. The med-bay door hushing open did not register (stitches could be better), nor the stumbling, but the vomiting did. Brains snapped on a fresh pair of nitrile gloves like a TSA agent preparing for a cavity exam. “Would you please take it from here? Let me know when she regains conscious—”

z-zombie.

“—ness.” Brains’s bones screeched as he whirled on the word—but his anger curdled when he saw a human curled up like a ball. His training told him that this was called the ‘fetal position,’ but he could only remember the giant ravens that made their nests in the ruined skyscrapers of his home-world. ‘Curl up like a ball,’ the liches said. ‘It won’t hurt you.’ He should have declined their offer. She cowered. He knelt with outstretched hands.

“I am not going to hurt you—” Another hush—running feet and a thick slab of steel hurtled overhead. There was no way to get out of the way. He was too slow. Brains ‘instinctively’ braced himself and screwed his eyes shut. He could only think:

It’s going to be a lie after all.

Seconds passed. An eternity passed, but the darkness did not come. He tentatively opened his eyes. The deck plating behind him had been reduced to a crumpled ruin—the floor had buckled under the force of the blow. His body shielded the human from the slab—a door?—and Brains fell. If his heart still beat, it would have thundered in the silence, but only a rattle wormed from the hole in his throat. He scrambled backward and tried to force himself into the wall when it stopped his retreat.

Brains sat, panting (unnecessarily), and shaking in some sort of crazed reverse rigor. He could not stop the convulsions. Malcolm took one look at the assailant and fled. “GO ROT YOU RUNNER! I HOPE YOU TURN!” A distant scream—scared, high-pitched. Distant, far away—save for the door that had nearly killed him. Brains could not look away from it—pulsing with malevolent energy. It shifted position with all the majesty of a titan throwing a mountain at a puny god.

His attacker sheepishly hid the door behind his puny frame. His attacker had some sort of animal ears. His attacker was speaking to him. His attacker. His attacker. The thing that tried to kill him was now telling him not to scare people. ‘His friends.’ A fire flared. The shivering stopped. Brains got to his feet. His shadow twisted and writhed like someone introduced to massive electrical shocks.

Brains towered over his attacker—by no means did he think that he could fight him. “…scare my friends? How did I scare them? How? Is it because I look like this? Of course it is. It always rotting is. Maybe you should tell your friends not be afraid of someone because of how they look.” He was on a roll. Shadow #2. “How dare you call me ‘friend.’ How dare you joke about ‘scaring people.’ You tried to murder me in hot rotting blood just now and you are festered enough to call me your ‘friend?’”

He jabbed his bony fingers in the thing’s (with the animal ears) face. “No. That is a compliment where I am from. I would never want to eat you or anyone on this Pit-Bound ship.” Brains shoved past animal-ears as his triplet shadows crawled and spidered after him. He turned back. “I helped your rotting crewmember. She is not mine because I know where I stand on this ship. I’m just a nine-a-knuckle, huh?”

Just like the liches. “You can find shamblers anywhere, I bet you thought. Just crush this one. We can get ten more just like him. Well, you can go rot.” He remembered the birds cawing as they tore him apart. ‘Let the ravens eat him.’  He punched the door-open button. Several bones in his hand fractured. “Rotting…”  He began cursing, but the hush of the door and the silence of the medical bay swallowed his words. He stalked down a silent hallway, but soon people began poking their heads out.

They yanked them back in like frightened turtles when they saw him though. He shambled past a room with the door ripped from its hinges. A moment later, Brains ducked into another. Brains waited for the hush behind him and collapsed against the door, sliding down into a sitting position. He ripped off the torn nitrile gloves and cradled his ruined left hand.

He began rocking back and forth. The dead have no tears to shed, but he had never been so scared.
---
Fact of 2nd Post: ‘The Pit’ is hell.