Oregon Trail Revitalized Part 2 - RPLOG
From Flexible Survival
Participants
Date
3/11/2022
Log
(Erika) A call to action was made, and that call was answered. Many showed up. Not all would remain, but those that did either look forward to a bright future, or are just in it for the money or adventure. Perhaps they're just bored, who's to say? Regardless, the fearless and intrepid Oregon adventurers have continued their journey. As per the plan, Moresson the power-armored husky remains behind to guard the way-too-many crates of food, while the rest delve into the wooded highways snaking through the Oregon hills, uncertain of what they'll find. At least, for the most part. As was previously mentioned, the team-leading husky known as Erika spotted a lake some ways down the highway, and desires to set up shop next to it on what's left of the marina. Carrying a backpack that's little more than duct tape and dreams, the husky leads the way along the blacktop. Obviously no cars are running at this point, so she fearlessly walks straight down the middle. A lot of the pavement is old, faded, and cracked. Much of the old world paint has chipped off by now, leaving each street mostly bare of directions. Roots, moss, and other foliage pierce through most of the cracks, slowly consuming what was once a frequently-used highway from civilization to Crater Lake, before the world changed. Now only those who take the RSX chopper tend to visit the natural wonder. "Remember, team. This is the most important directive. If we encounter people in the places we wish to inhabit, it's already theirs. We're asking to stay in their home. This is still the case, even if they're ferals. We can set up nearby and rehabilitate them. Only use force if there's no other alternative. We're not wrestling infrastructure or land away from anyone who already lives there. We're exploring and settling. Peace and coexistence is key." she tells the whole group, glancing back at them, adjusting the black cowgirl hat she wears. Beyond the edges of the road, dense forest stretches on as far as the eye can see, and the weather is fairly cold out here.
(Euoia) Euoia's senses were on high alert. Along with her special targeting tracker, she was keeping tabs on everything nearby. She had it ignore the group in favor of pointing out other things nearby. Rocks... stones... trees... these targets could be overlooked. She literally could not find any targets. Just minerals and flora. Keeping a small bubble of nanites to protect everyone from the lack there-of was taking most of her attention anyway. The anime babe was excited but on edge as her mind and gear were in a minor fervor. Euoia nodded to Erika and said, "sure thing. Cohabitation is the goal. Got it." Still, this is unknown terratory for her. And she was not gonna lose an information war.
(Fenris) Fenris saunters along the road, humming and singing to himself. Some song about digging a hole, or building a wall or something. Where earlier the tanuki wore a rather absurd looking mascot suit, today he is rather on the grungy side, wearing a rather lived-in looking tank top and jeans, with a hard hat and big, stompy boots. He is also wearing a dingy, canvas jacket with "Property of Tanuki" stamped on it as a concession to the weather, though it hangs open, so he probably isn't actually cold. He gives the impression of nothing so much as a scruffy blue collar worker. "Sure thing, Boss!" he grins and gives a lazy salute, then scratches his chest idly as he looks around at the gathered group.
(Chessly) Chessly's kept himself in the center of the pack, the feline made sure he'd be safe and sound. Ears perk up at Erika's directive, and nods along. "Avoid disrupting the native ecosystem, got it!" The cat's brain tinkers up some ways on making a rehabilitation facility, with having some experience with the Prometheans he's got a few methods on handling ferals.
(Junes) seeing as euoia was on surveillance and chessly was planning something up junes glanced at the plants and wondering aloud "I wonder if we'll be able to see some rare bugs around" and marched in a lax manner wondering about the sights and progress they can make once at the location
(Anbessa) Anbessa rolls his shoulders lightly, having previously joined in on helping move boxes as he walks along to catch up to Erika now that the crates were all situated. With him padding along the road as well, though more along the sides nearer to whatever sidewalks or shoulders to the road there might be, the buck hums gently as the large lapine moves along with his ears perked high. He is currently holding his polearm in his grasp, though he is currently using it more like a walking stick, light clicks heard as it taps the ground now and again, periodically nudging a rock or pebble out of his way without slowing down as if to amuse himself. Of course Erika speaking does make the bun perk up, nodding his head gently. "Lets hope they are amicable to new neighbors then." He says simply, glancing about as his ears stay lifted atop of his head as his tail lightly twitches periodically whenever he notices something unique like a plant or any other sorts of unique wildlife.
(Erika) Erika smiles at the affirmative replies she gets, her tail wagging a little behind her. "Good. Then hopefully this will go smooth. Just be ready for anything. I'm heading away from the directions where all the other failed missions encountered packminds, so hopefully we'll be safe. My previous directive does not apply to them." she says, glancing back to Junes and chuckling. "Probably. We're going to be learning everything we can. This includes flora and fauna." she says, keeping up a decent pace. The roads in this area are quite remote, and therefore don't have sidewalks. Not on the highway in the middle of the woods. The most you'd get is a length of guard rail. For a while the walk is fairly peaceful. Up in the wooded hills of Oregon, things are quiet. But every once in a while Euoia's target locator picks up a brief blip, but never anything more than a split second. First, a ways into the woods in the right, then the left. Some more ahead of them, some more behind. Never anything more than a very brief... Something.
(Euoia) Euoia looks around a few times to try and catch what blip keeps appearing on her device. "I'm getting a minor random blip of fauna out here. Either we are being followed or there is a curious george that is protecting something. Can't get a good enough read on it." She keeps looking out more intently, the mild glow from her gear giving a scant amount of light around her. "I think we are still good to go. One follower would just be a curiousity. If i get more blips, then we should proceed cautiously."
(Fenris) Fenris saunters along gamely, his long bladed, short spear jingling on his back. "I wouldn't mind seeing a Bear," he admits, "Never met one of Bear's fingers. Fox is pretty nice, long as you keep hands off, but wolf is a real piece of work." He says all of this as casually as if he were listing off guests at an office holiday party. The burly tanuki nods off in the direction of Crater Lake. "The Packminds generally stay away from the lake though. Coyote does not like them much." Just normal conversation while walking in a very wild wilderness.
(Chessly) Chessly wasn't used to seeing this part of the world, and wanting to get a better look at it the cat's curiosity got the better of him, eventually he wonders out of the pack, off the blacktop and past the lapine. He takes a deep breath embracing the wild-life. As the blip goes off the cat eyes go wide to scurry over to Erika, all of the feline's focus is honed in on the little doohickey she has. "Oohhhh! Once we have time can I mess around with that little thing? I'm assuming that's supposed to detect...ferals...like a haz?"
(Junes) hearing about the inconsistent radar the short chimera perked up a bit and decided to look further into the woods in case a deer is seen or potential dangers and jumped a bit not expecting the cat to dash around and sighed in relief. "hopefully just some animals around, but if you need i can try to sneak ahead or pretend to be feral if need be" junes eyes didn't leave the forest after the small scare before
(Anbessa) Anbessa lifts his ear higher as he hears Euoia, though given the bunny already has his weapon out as he walks, all the warning does is prompt the bunny to have a tighter grip on his polearm. Otherwise he still is just using it more like a walking stick at the moment... But the rabbit IS still visibly armed. "Well... Can only hope it is just someone curious. Gods know if we draw a Packmind's ire that it'd not go well for us." He notes with a shudder. "Gods, I know not all packminds are bad, but... I certainly can recall some aren't exactly friendly either." He says with noticable tension in his voice. He certainly is walking with a stern posture, but now he is just moreso alert.
(Erika) As if only to prove the anime babe wrong, the blips do present themselves for brief periods on both sides in too quick of succession to be just one follower. About every few minutes, there could be one blip at 2 o'clock, the another at 8 o'clock seconds later. Sometimes perhaps one at both 3 o'clock and 9 o'clock simultaneously. But just as quickly as the blips are seen, they go dark. However, as Chessly and Junes stray off the road, the blips disappear, and no more are seen after that. Erika glances about, holding one of her paws to a holster on one of her wide hips. "No, Junes. No splitting up, or bait tactics. We stay together. If they're not getting closer, then we keep going. We can secure this road later once we have an outpost." she says, keeping her eyes peeled. As the group continues down the road though, no more seem to appear. And after a few hours of travel they come upon a bridge over a creek. The bridge seems to be concrete like most others, but this one actually does seem to have somewhat of a sidewalk on both sides, built from wood. These wooden side paths have wooden rails, though one side is broken out, as if a car had gone off the road. Speaking of which, there is a large RV rusting away on the bridge, about the middle. It's positioned opposite the busted rail, and points towards Crater Lake, back where the group is coming from.*
(Euoia) Euoia sighs. "Multiple curious contacts. Some group is watching. Lets prove we're friendly then." She grabs the flask hanging on her left shoulder and takes a swig. She started to relax a little more. "I got some berries if anyone wants some." She opened her runed belt pouch and took one out for a snack.
(Fenris) Fenris picks his teeth with a stubby claw and raises an eyebrow at the rusting RV. "What do we have here?" he asks, sauntering toward the old vehicle on the bridge. He does not draw a weapon, but holds his hands where they are easily visible. "Hello?" he calls in a friendly tone, "Anybody home?" He does pause long enough to accept a berry or two from Euoia before resuming his advance onto the bridge.
(Chessly) Chessly's eyes go wide at the RV, it's rusty, huge, and conveniently in the middle of the road on a bridge, hungry to take a look at the vehicle to see what's salvageable the cat shuffles to the middle of the road so he can get a chance to see what he can pull. Maybe he'll find a car battery, hotwire the car and see how far he can go on the hunk of junk, or fix up the radio and see if there's anything playing all the way out here.
(Junes) responding to erika the nine-tailed hissah said "dont worry I wouldn't go before i knew everyone was ready, and of course if feral i would use good old fashioned diplomacy" but seeing the rv they quickly checked the back window to see if anything was in the backseat or trunk and under the vehicle itself, making sure its not some sort of trap
(Anbessa) Anbessa, like the others, curiously gazes at the rusty RV parked in the road, though the bun still seems to be moreso being cautious right now as he keeps his polearm in hand as he stands nearby Erika, glancing over to the husky for a moment before looking towards the RV. "Hope the nanites can keep Tetanus away too." He says with a small snicker. Though seeing Junes go to inspect around the RV, the buck perks his ears and starts to move moreso around the vehicle in more of a wider berth. Not getting close, but certainly looking it over to check for anything that might look recently fiddled with on the rustbucket.
(Luard) What's that in the sky? A terrifying dragon come to destroy everyone with fire? A sentient plane or some other horrifying machination of the nanites come to torture everyone's poor souls? Nope, it's a big... winged... dog? Wide white feathered wings beat in the sky as the large alpha husky comes into view, dressed in the same shirt and jeans as before, his wings slowly lowering him down towards the group as he lands nearby, his wings beating kicking up a small storm around him as he lands, letting out a long sigh and dusting his fur down as his wings fold up behind him. "Sorry Erika. Got turned around scouting out over the forest. Thought I heard you guys earlier, but it sure wasn't you. Glad I managed to get back in time though."
