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Peach Bringer
a7a180
>Scavenge quickly
Looking around didn’t turn up much of value. I tried to pick up an armored vest but ended up tearing away the piece in my grip. It’s firm and compresses well, just don’t pull it apart and it’s still good. I think.
>Obtained: Scrap of armor
>Into the hole
Our climbing gear helps us drop down safely, but the hole is jagged and lots of exposed support beams and metal edges threaten to tear a gouge or worse out of the unaware urban explorer. Pent’s the first to go down the hole, antennae on a swivel for any downstairs denizens. A slow minute goes by before she reaches the bottom, giving us the all clear.
“I’m lowering you down next,” Jaina tells me. “Remember, tug twice when you’re ready to send it back up, three times if you need to be pulled back up fast. Push the rope away from anything sharp and keep a close antenna out yourself.”
“Don’t worry, it’s not my first time rappelling. I know the basics of it.”
“Good, then don’t forget them.” Hah, no pressure!
A minute seems to pass even slower when I’m the one on the rope. The descent is slow and jerky, getting eased down an arm’s length at a time. I try to avoid deep breaths in the meantime, the hole smells sharply of burnt plastic. Floor after floor of dormitories go by. I can barely see anything around me, but I don’t care to turn on my flashlight and look.
The hole continues all the way to the ground floor lobby. Pent watches me descend and motions to stay quiet. The Beformicans have laid out an indoor tent city here for their sleeping quarters, with individual nests partitioned by hanging leaves. Flickering shadows indicate there’s at least a couple people still moving around there The escalators block me from sight of the main floor, but I can see more bad news below: the back doors have been blocked off by some kind of makeshift shrine.
The shrine consists of a scrap metal statue of a Beformican with the distinctive collar of a scientist, presumably the same one in the graffiti upstairs. He’s flanked by a pair of large candles lighting up a mural of yellowed paper. It’s impressive, actually, this is much more artistic than I’d come to expect from these guys. The candlelight casts his shadow over scenes of Formicans etched into the wall. The top left scene shows a crowd of bone-thin, sad Formicans, and the scientist holding a strand of DNA, I think. Below that, a group of half-normal, half-altered Formicans are undergoing the transformation alongside him, kneeling before him in what is clearly worship. The other side shows a group of Beformicans fighting a group of Formicans with helmets. The true believers are fighting and winning. The helmeted soldiers are fleeing before them. The last scene is the Beformicans standing in a ring around the scientist, holding hands.
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