Maps and Stuff

Planet Xuno

While it didn't exactly look familiar to the bard 'spacer, Fitz could take a jab in the dark at what was going on - to him it looked like some kind of quarantined area, the people were as thin as his guitar's strings if not more so but he he now knew at least that his previous statement had been false.

"Yeahhh nuh nope," Fitz began musing as he turned to face the two fellow explorers, platinum blonde spikes of synthetic hair jostling slightly in the wind as he stood there proudly with a hand on each hip. "Definitely not jovial, the people down there look like they're five feet under already and quickly approaching six - some kind of plague maybe?" he continued, the 'spacer counted himself lucky he was only pseudo-synthetic under all that armour and not actually the real deal - if things got too bad he could always shed the shell and flee into some other digital system for a bit.

"What do you guys reckon is going on here?"

Planet Xuno

The shuttle would come to a complete stop, allowing the small group to move about the cabin.

Green Bean was quite happy to head down the side ramp out towards the village.

"Well. There has to be something making them sick right?" He asked, "They have food... it looks like they are able to pull fish that are just floating there... it doesn't make sense that they are hungry... but they are wasting away.

It doesn't look like a disease either... I think we would see them coughing right? Or oozing... A disease has to be one of the two right?"

Green-Bean may not have been an expert medic. But his assessment seemed to be correct. People were wasting away and dieing. It also seemed like this problem stretched beyond just the people. There were lots of dead fish in the river. Those fish were being scooped up by nets to be used as food by the locals.

Planet Xuno

A sigh left Fitz's synthetic maw as his hand snaked up, thumb slipping underneath the top lip and other fingers reaching into the eye sockets - he gave it a tug of frustration that stretched the artificial skin away from his metal fac comically, releasing it with a small snap before the facade re-adjusted itself and he once again just looked like some guy in armour.

"You're right, is there anything industrial up-river from here?" the bard began asking, backing up until he was dangerously close to falling out of their shuttle. It made sense to him... then again so did his last theory, but you spill something and it runs to the lowest point it can find to he felt the same logic might apply here - something in the water might've been killing the fish and then the people that ate them.

Planet Xuno

Stratus suddenly popped up, almost out of nowhere, to pipe in "Actually, there is a factory thataway." He shot his arm up to point downstream, causing the plating to flip open and knock a few wires out. He looked annoyed, shaking his arm to try and shake them back in until he gave up and decided to ignore it.

"It has a warehouse and everything, so its most likely dumping stuff into this waterway." said the scruffy spacer, looking downstream and squinting into the distance. "You can... you might be able to see the smoke from here, if you look hard enough." he said as he leaned towards the horizon, cupping his hands around his eyes like a binoculars as if he could see further like that. He couldn't.

Planet Xuno

Green Bean nodded, "Do either of you guys have something we can use to test the water?"

It seemed to make sense. No telling what was in the water exactly. Then again it did look like the fish were dead... and there were people eating the fish. Those people also seemed to be ending up dead. The water in the lake was not exactly 'clear' either.

"Or, maybe we should just go check out that factory. I'm always told never drink the water unless a tech-guy has cleaned it."

Green Bean would call up one of the mini-tanks, having it ride low to the ground so that he could climb up onto the front,

"Lets roll down to that factory then..."

--

Planet Xuno, Factory

The trip to the factory was fairly short, as it was not far away from where the group originally landed.

The entire path there was filled with home and small businesses, many of which used the water from the river. Many were similarly on Stratus' list, and those same homes also had either been torn down or blocked off. No doubt those inside having died recently.

When they reached the factory itself they would find a waterwheel on the outside, as well as a water intake pipe. There was an outlet pipe as well but it seemed to go underground and exited directly into the river itself.

The first floor was entirely brick, with two sets of heavy metal doors blocking the entrance. On the second floor there were windows, but there didn't seem to be anyone behind those windows.

A dull black cloud and the sound of machinery inside was enough to indicate that at least someone was inside.

"HEY! CAN WE COME INSIDE AND LOOK AROUND!?" Green bean shouted. Though it appeared he was not loud enough for anyone inside to hear as no one came to the door.

Planet Xuno, Factory

Fitz let out a small chuckle as he saw the aural attempt to grab attention, there was a much better and in his opinion a much cooler way to do that.

The bard reached back to the guitar that hung from his back and tweaked one of it's many dials, a small flame flickered out one of the nozzles momentarily before he tapped two fingers to the side of his neck. It sounded as if somebody had tapped a microphone but it as all a rather normal thing for the metal man, seeming rather pleased as a cable from the guitar was plugged into his side.

"You might want to cover your auditory sensors, kiddos, this is going to be loud," Fitz advised before clearing his non-existent throat and taking in a fake breath of air to lungs he didn't possess, he raised one metallic, plated hand into the air and let it hang there dramatically for a moment before it was brought down on a fluid motion toward the guitar.

What followed was an exceedingly loud riff from what sounded like an electric guitar, it was intense but ultimately short lived before Fitz called out, "Is anybody home?" from his speaker-like setup underneath that face.

Planet Xuno, Factory

"Huh?", mumbled Stratus, not quite getting what he meant. But, after seeing the instrument (and hearing the resulting sound), he knew what to do: cover his ears and pray he doesn't go deaf.

He was just a bit too late, as he had just gotten an earful of guitar. The force of acoustics shock nearly knocked him to the ground, although it was more like bringing him to his knees. As he kneeled, hoping that he doesn't go deaf after this adventure, he began to reconsider his musical tastes. Maybe he'd try classical, he thought.

In the meantime, his metallic limbs began vibrating and emitted a metallic, reverberating sound. It seemed that loud, intense noise did not go along with hollow metal constructs. This gave him another thing to reconsider, which he brushed off as being a design flaw he'd have to live with.

Planet Xuno, Factory

"GO AWAY!!!"

Someone from inside the factor shouted, and then a rock was thrown in their direction that came up through a half opened window and then down a few feet short of its target. The screams from the inside were loud, but they were also very easily drown'd out by the Guitar Riff.

Green-Bean got a laugh out of this, his eyes were focused on the building for the moment, missing the damage that was done to Stratus,

"Heh... can we go louder?

...I mean... Seriously...

Turn it to 11."

"Now that is tickling my pickle, and you'd best bet I like having my pickle tickled - but who am I to turn down cheers for an encore?" Fitz beamed back at his two companions, fiddling with a few more dials and buttons on his guitar that resulted in happy beeps and whistles from the weaponised instrument.

"I'll put it up to twelve, just for you two lovelies," the musical 'spacer added with a wink of his synthetic eyebrow, adjusting his feet and going silent for dramatic effect.

What followed started off similar to some kind of shanty a crew might come up with to alleviate boredom and raise morale on long voyages, it subtly but surely built up in intensity before Fitz aimed the guitar down to his metallic feet and clicked his heels together - a spark ignited the small stream of flammable vapour the bard had been releasing, causing the sky to be filled with an orange pillar of flame as the song suddenly and rather violently shifted into something you'd find in the crescendo of a heavy metal song.

More flame was fired harmlessly into the sky to make his shrill strikes at the guitar seem so much more badass than it already was, or at least that was the bard's intention.

The sound put out by the Bard was joined by the sound of windows and doors starting to rattle. A bit more smoke starting to rise from inside of the building, followed by someone throwing a bucket of rocks out the window... which landed a few feet short of the noisy bard.

Soon, the doors would be thrown open, a rather fat, short, man stomping out dressed in overalls and a brown shirt.

"....! ....!!!! ...!!!! !!...!!..!!!!!!"

It was clear he was yelling something,an angrily walking towards the bard with a metal pipe in hand... though he only got as far as Green-Bean who simply picked him up by the collar and grabbed the pipe, throwing it off into the distance.

Green-Bean would point towards the inside of the factory now that the door was open. There was an office overlooking the main floor, which seemed to be filled with some kind of machinery. Large boxes of 'stuff' were strewn about the whole location, and there were pipes heading in and out... including one that seemed to drain to the river.

Fitz brought a quick conclusion to his little piece of musical might, dropping into a low bow as his electronic eyes dimmed for a second before the capacitors in his system were charged back up via his Aether heart - at which point the bard rose back up to stand tall and proud with vividly blue eyes.

"Many thanks, my dear green-bean - now would you mind asking this stout fellow what he is pumping into the river while I go check to see if he is telling the truth? Be back in a jiffy," Fitz offered rather eloquently before the guitar was slung over his shoulder and the 'spacer hopped down from their ride with a thud on the ground below.

He was rather proud of the performance, sure he was down an aerosol can but in his mind the badass flames had been worth it - Fitz approached where something most likely foul was being mixed in with the water, he extended a pointer finger forwards and had the armour plating retract to reveal white, sensitive, synthetic muscles beneath. This naked finger was dipped into the water as he let liquid flow through this sensitive material, gathering whatever data he could about things such as the water's composition, acidity, temperature and what not.

Worst case scenario, he'd have to wait a few days for the finger's muscle-like structure to regrow if for any reason he had to lop it off.