Institute (B)

A white light shone into Arc Weld’s face; filling the unicorn’s reality with an almost unbearable but constantly dimming expanse of pure white complete with horrible ringing noise.

Eventually the light faded, bringing the world back into view. Arc Weld was within a forest, complete with chirping birds and sunlight shining through the trees. These trees were not the mangled carcasses often found in the waste, but were instead healthy and calming. Unlike the room from earlier nothing seemed downright wrong or unreal once one got past the doubt that such a place could exist in the wastes. There were no moving paintings, no unnerving statues, no breakable skys. While the gear that had been missing from before the paintasi room was still missing, any objects picked up in the room remained. This included the Luna statue, still resting peacefully upon Arc’s head.

While the forest looked mostly like a massive expanse of trees in every direction, there was a house slightly to the north and a dirt path heading to both the left and the right. The south, while not appearing particularly welcome or notable, was also an option.

The unicorn was currently alone, but perhaps others would join him in time.

Arc got up on all his hooves and shook his head a little. When his head stopped spinning and his ears stopped ringing he slowly look round himself.

Arc had seen trees before, back in the stable's orchards, but they were all artificially supported and made bear fruit as often as possible, not truly natural entities but more of true organic machines. This place... Arc had no idea where he was. Real trees, birds that were openly loud about their position, the air... Arc inhaled. Yes, the air was not only feeling as clean as the one filtrated by the stable's life support system, but this one had healthy scent to it, something hard to pinpoint, smelling elusively sweet and warm.

Yep. Everything points to it being too good to be true, but at least I'm gone from that horrible room. So...

Arc looked around, contemplating his options.

...the house could be a good landmark. Guess I should start there.

The brown stallion started galloping towards the house north of him.

You are standing upon the porch of a white house with a boarded front door. There is a small mailbox in front of the house, though you can see that it is empty from the limply hanging door that is it empty. To your left, there seems to be a door heading to some kind of external cellar. To your right sits a giant Kes.

Wait, what?

The air shimmered slightly as Kestrel slowly manifested next to Arc from seemingly nowhere at all. Kes’ eyes might take a few moments to adjust to his personal change of light, but was otherwise unharmed. Like Arc, everything the griffon had picked up stayed on his possession. Unlike Arc, he was not carrying them around in a blanket.

The house itself seemed simple enough, though the boarded front door was strange, especially since the light coming through the windows suggested that someone or something was inside. Arc could probably squeeze through a window, but there was no way Kestrel would manage such a thing. The cellar door was closed, but didn’t look particular sturdy if it was even locked. If the two ventured behind the house they would find a locked tool shed, along with a small collection of potted plants.

Kestrels eyes eased open, his pupils shrinking and then growing as they adjusted to the new light levels in the room. A strange tingling sensation rushed throughout his form, and his stomach felt like it was going to start doing tricks any moment now.

Damn magic.

Glancing around the room Kestrel began to study his surroundings, his gaze eventually locking on Arc, scanning him over intimately before the griffon offered a silent nod in greeting.

He recognized the kid, one of the travelers on the caravan he had been with before all of...this had happened. Perhaps he had a better idea about what was going on?

"How'd you get here?" Kestrel asked quietly, looking around checking out the rest of the house. Going off of the lighting, someone, or something, outside. A nearby window seemed the easiest exit, to small for Kestrel however.

At least, it was if Kestrel wanted to be quiet about things. Which, luckily, he did.

Stood in front of the mailbox for a while, wondering how bad was delivering mail here, in the middle of goddesses know large forest. Perhaps if the mail delivery pony was pegasus, then maybe it was probably less absurdly hard work, but since the box had probably not seen mail in hundreds of years, Arc disembarked that train of thought and moved to the porch.

The sudden appearance of a large griffin out of the thin air started Arc and he jumped scared away. He started to back from the porch and looked around for a way to run away, perhaps hide in the house, but then the large griffin nodded to him, a gesture that was unlikely to come from something that was about to have him for a dinner. Arc's fear reaction was derailed for a while and he recognized Kestrel's form, calming down somewhat.

"I was teleported here after touching a large sphere." the stallion responded while still lightly panting from the scare the griffin gave him. Arc noticed how the griffin looked at the window, it seemed large enough for him to get inside.

"I suppose we could look inside for a map, or at least some supplies. I'll try to open the door from inside for you."

Arc walked to the window and started climbing in it, slowly squeezing himself through it.

Kestrel grunted and stood up to his full height, following silently after the young buck that was now his partner in this strange world. So, he had arrived much the same way that Kestrel had. Interesting.

Hearing the game plan Kestrel decided to keep watch as Arc tried to get the window open for him. If that failed, Kestrel would start looking for another way in.

Arc got through with little issue. The hardest part had actually been preventing Luna from getting in the way.

The inside of the house looked quaint and rustic. The brown unicorn’s hooves clopped on old wooden floorboards as he moved to the door and unlocked it. Even after unlocking the door it wouldn’t open, however. The boards outside were probably holding it, though Kestrel would probably be able to break them. Sadly the sound of splintering wood probably wouldn’t mesh with the griffon’s idea of “quiet”

The soft sound of snoring was coming from one of the rooms behind Arc, whoever was in this house must be asleep.


Kestrel kept watch, but nothing particularly suspicious happened.

Hearing the click of a lock Kestrel turned and walked up onto the porch as quietly as he could, the door however was boarded up tighter than a tree trunk. He could have just torn through it...but he didn't want to risk detection.

He had no idea if there was anything else around after all.

Suppressing a frown Kestrel backed off the porch and began to circle the house, perhaps there was some other entrance? An open window or perhaps a cellar door? A hole in the roof even.

Walking around to the back of the house Kestrel found something that just might work; a cellar door. Keeping with his code of silence the big griffon snuck over as best he could and tried to open the cellar. Should it open without hesitation, Kestrel would descend into the depths and try to find a way upstairs after letting his eyes adjust.

Should it be locked however Kestrel would start looking around for something to open it with. A key for example, perhaps it was under one of the potted plants? Or even inside the soil? Who knew, in any case should the search become required, Kestrel would execute it as best he could, standing still and focusing on his search.

(Sneaking about, trying the cellar door. If locked looking for a key in the plants; 10 perception. If not locked entering the house as quietly as possible)

The lock managed to lightly click and release its grasp on the door frame. The door themselves turned out to be still blocked by the planks that were nailed to them outside. Well, Kestrel probably herd the lock move, so if he wished for this entrance, Arc was sure the griffin could easily undo the obstruction.

The snoring that suddenly became heard made Arc freeze his whole body, trying to stand still, holding his breath and listening, hearing only the sound of something peacefully sleeping and his own heartbeat.

After the few heart attack inducing moments when Arc realized he might have woken whatever it was, and subsequent realization that he in fact did not, he eased and started to slowly move towards the sound, shifting his centre of mass on the hooves that were on the floor and lightly moving the other, making as little sound as he could to not wake the occupant...yet.

The cellar door opened with a creek, allowing Kestrel to descend into the dark and slightly dank smelling area. It appeared as though this was some sort of study; various diagrams of the various equine breeds lined the walls, showing many details about their anatomy. There was a freezer against the wall, seemingly the sole powered object within the room, there wasn’t even a source of light aside from the light shining through the door Kestrel had just been through. A wardrobe sat across from the freezer, resting silently against its wall. A desk, not dissimilar to the one that had been the the pegasus room, sat beside the set of stairs leading into the house. There were some various scalpels and other clean tools sitting within its open drawer, the desk itself had the occasional bloodstain.

Should he try it, the Trapdoor would open and lead into the house without much problem. The gray griffon would emerge into what seemed to be a kitchen. He could hear snoring, as well as Arc Weld’s hoofsteps.

Speaking of Arc, the unicorn crept as slightly as possible, though the going was hard considering each and every wooden plank seemed eager to scream a creek into the air at the very idea of his touch. Weld’s movement towards the sound eventually led him to a plain wooden door, which would open with a squeak to show a cozy pre-war living room. The snoring seemed to be coming from an elderly white unicorn in a doctor’s outfit splaying upon the couch with open mouth and a newspaper resting upon his back. He didn’t wake up.

Scanning the cellar for anything of use, Kestrel honestly could not say there was anything that popped out to him. The freezer was really the only object of interest to Kestrel, and his stomach was not exactly acting up demanding food; thus it was ignored.

With nothing stopping him Kestrel eased himself over to the Trapdoor and pushed it open as quietly as he could, pulling himself up into the room above him.

Judging by its appearance he had managed to find the kitchen, the sound of hoof steps and creaking boards revealed Arc's location. Snoring coming from another room.

So, they were not alone after all? Interesting.

Pulling himself all the way up and once more closing the trapdoor, Kestrel began to make his way towards sound of the snoring, timing his steps so that their sounds, or the creaking of the woodwork would be masked by the sounds of snoring.

The pony seemed to remain in the grasp of sleep, even though Arc probably managed to make creak even the planks that he did not stepped onto. The pony himself seemed... well, one would say as a thing of little potential danger, especially in this state. There was something soothingly mesmerizing seeing somepony just... sleep, just calmly and suddenly fall asleep, not many occasions for such thing in the Wastes.

Nonetheless, he lived here, or at least the logic would imply it, so Arc decided to step closer to the sofa. He opened his moth and in calm manner said "Um... hello? I'm terribly sorry to wake you and... well, pretty much break into your house, but... we're kinda lost in the woods here." Should he not wake up, Arc would have stepped closer and tapped him with his hoof to wake him up, once again explaining his position.

One might guess, with perfectly valid reasoning, that an elderly unicorn freshly awakened by a complete stranger while sleeping by himself in a boarded up house in the middle of nowhere would startle and enter a panic, struggling and screaming at the intruder. Such a guess, if wagered, would prove completely wrong.

One of the buck’s blue eyes opened and subjected Weld to a hard glare, as though the white unicorn was somehow weighing the younger buck’s entire universe-wide existence in a single gaze. Kestrel had, by this time, found the proper room undetected and was more than capable of listening in.

“Aint my house.” The medical garbed pony finally growled quietly before reclosing his eye. “T’aint yours, neither. You got thirty minutes to get back to your station ‘fore I turn you off.”

From his place in the shadows Kestrel listened wordlessly, deciding to hold back for now and intervene only if the situation went FUBAR.

What the elder pony had said was rather confusing. 'Stations?' Kes had only heard such terms used by military and mercenary groups before. Was this some kind of military operation?

Considering the Steel Rangers had attacked and apparently captured them it could have very well been one. Best to keep listening in for now though, let Arc and the Elder explain reveal a bit more about what was going on.

The stallion woke up, and to Arc's surprise, just looked on him, though Arc would say it was more of an invasive disassembly of his person by the blue eye that opened. Arc moved back few steps just by how deep the look was, his face cringing in sudden fear.

"Thirty minutes? What station? I... I don't even know how I got here, I just touched an orb and next moment I woke up on the forest floor, in the middle of Luna knows where!"

(Sorry for the bad and small post. It's been a bad day. You guys are definitely getting an extra update this week probably around Wednesday to make up for the poor size and quality of today's)


The buck’s eyes shot open and he positively glared at Weld.

“Yer a patient? Celestia damn it all I thought I had scrapped the last of those idiotic robots.” He growled, as though everything wrong in the entire world was Weld’s fault, and Weld’s fault alone.

“I ‘spose your gonna be doin a whole lot of that annoying thing where stupid noises come out of yer mouth until I appease you, so let’s make this quick. You get three questions. I suggest you prove yourself better than the rest of your feebleminded companions and think before asking them”

Arc almost instinctively stammered out "Who are you?", followed by "Where am I?", but he managed to stop his mouth soon enough to just look at the stallion with a scared expression in his face. He needed to think about this more.

"In where am I supposed to be a patient?"

Kestrel kept hidden for now, lowering himself to the ground a bit as he prepared to pounce if need be. Arc seemed to be handling himself well enough however...at least for now.

“Well, ‘least you worded it slightly fancier than “where am I”. Which is good, ‘cuz otherwise I would prolly have just told you that yer on the old floorboards of some old shack. You’re a patient in Lemi. EL EE EM IE. T’is an abbreviation. Two left.”

An abbreviation. How nice, the old buck is trying to screw with me by making me ask what it abbreviates... thought Arc. Then he took a deep breath, buying some time for himself to think of the question.

"Now... since I'm clearly not in a position to just get up and leave, how do become a not-patient of Lemi? And please be specific, not just 'You leave through the front door, dumbass'."

“Ya don’t.” The buck growled, giving Arc a look that suggested quite accurately that he didn't like the younger pony's mouth and would very happily break it if the brown unicorn didn't learn to control the thing. A tingling sensation behind Arc's horn suggested that something else felt that the old buck would be missing a few limbs if he did so much as try. It almost seemed like that would be the entire answer until finally he continued. “Least, not yet. In case you aint figured it out in that dusty little brain o’ yours, this here’s a simulation. My own personal prison, cept I guess she ‘cided I wasn’t suffering ‘nuff recentdays and sent me a couple of annoying houseguests. If’n you see the other one, do me a favor and point him the opposite way of me.”

Kestrel narrowed his eyes as he processed the information given to him by the unknowing audience. The 'advice' given to Arc to tell Kes was rather ironic. Kes planned on steering clear of him anyway. No need to let everything in the area know you're there after all.

Shifting a bit so as to get a better angle on things Kestrel focused his ears and eyes again. He had a feeling that the buck was about to try something...though he couldn't fathom why.

So he knew about Kestrel... well, at least there was little point in being sneaky, at least it seemed. And my brain isn't dusty... Arc thought. Nevertheless, the tickling inside his head wasn't exactly pleasant. Arc had one last question.

"Who, or what, is this 'she' you are referring to?"

Kes shifted slightly and got a better view, a floorboard creaked ever so slightly from his shift but it didn’t seem to alert the buck. He seemed pretty boring and nonthreatening despite his sour attitude. It was probably safe to do things other than stare a hole into his pony head.

“Insignificant, that’s what.” He growled. “Just some stuck up doctor bitch who fancies herself a professional. Thinks she knows how to run everything. “The buck stopped to shake his head. “I don’t even remember her name. Can you really blame me after spending two hundred years down here? Dunt answer that, cuz I don’t actually care what you think. Point is; you’re down here. She’s up there mucking about with things. Get comfortable, cuz unless the dumb mare’s shortsighted enough to send an entire army down here you aint getting out.”

A doctor then? Hmm, that didn't bode well. This place they were in must have been some kind of...experimental construct then. A rather strange one, and one that Kestrel was honestly not very intrested in being a part of.

The final statements of the cranky pony left Kestrel's mind buzzing with thoughts. Two hundred years? In this place? Now THAT was not an option. Kestrel cared little for this whole situation anyway and the more the pony talked the more Kestrel grew sour at the thought of it all.

Whoever did this, for whatever reason, was not on Kestrels good side. You could ask anyone that had ever been on Kes's bad side how terrible that was.

If you didn't mind talking to corpses that is.