They arrived at the tower, the dark spire twisting up from the desert sands into the sky.
The old man stopping, a half mile from it.
"This, my friends, is where we part ways, I believe, for a while anyway..."
Dracos
Darx grins, raising his gaze upwards.
"It's so...beautiful.."
Laughing gleefully, he takes off ahead of the group for the entrance.
"Hey! Wait up!" Jan ran after the winged man. "It's too dangerous to go in there!"
Darx stops and looks back, his wings flaring open as he turns, a wild grin on his face.
"I've waited too long for this, child. Hurry up if you want to come with me!"
He spins again, running back towards the tower.
Leets sighed, gazing towards the tower that was the source of their winged companion's antics. "You'd think he'd have some dignity," he muttered, taking his time following the group.
Ahead of the group as she was, it it wasn't long before Mei-Ling realised that they were either heading towards the same places she was, or towards the tower.
And when they did not change direction, and the black spire appeared on the horizon, her fears were realized.
While Darx and Jan rush towards the tower, she just stands still, letting sand swirl around her as she fully takes in the force exuding from the structure.
Without warning...
"It's beautiful and horrifying at the same time... it's just a spire of paradox unleashed. And, I'm not going in there in any way, shape, or form..."
Yep. That's Ryda... And she's standing right behind Mei in her slightly oversized outfit.
Darx stops at the entrance, childlike glee racing through him as he calls out.
"Are you all coming or not?"
Mei starts, and looks at Ryder.
"You.. you were with him," she says, turning around completely to face her.
"There's nothing beautiful from the outset. This thing is.. is.. a perversion! It shouldn't be here! It should not stand! If I had the power, I would tear it down! All I can feel from is darkness.. darkness and fear."
"Darkness and fear, which is exactly why I don't plan on going in that thing... I'd like to keep my soul where it is, instead of it like, being ripped out of my body and used as a blanket for some evil force..." Ryder mutters as she glances at Darx running towards it.
"If all of his people were like that, it's no wonder they all died out." she mentions blankly.
Mei-Ling stares after Darx, shaking her head. "How can the tower be anything but anathema to a living creature?" she asks, quietly. "I was tainted just by being near it, it felt.."
"... like the stench of pure, unadulturated evil. Like if Satan decided he wanted a Fortress of Solitude and threw a stag party with Hitler, Nero, and Barney..." Ryder muttered once more to Mei.
With another shudder, Ryder added, "If you don't know who Barney is, don't ask. Just think of the greatest evil you know, and then make it purple..."
"I don't know any of those names," says Mei-Ling. "What are you going to do? Just.. wait for him?"
"I expect Jan to stop him, or for him to end up as a bloody, incoherent mess... either way, I don't expect him to go in there." Ryder mentioned calmly.
"He seems pretty determined.." Mei-Ling shrugs.
"I think I'll wait.. and see what happens."
Darx, tired of waiting on his comrades, grins widely and turns back, looking for an entrance in.
On one side there are stairs of warm stone rising up from the sands towards the tower, coming, about five feet up, to an end against a large solid steel door. More of a massive gateway really than a door, as it stood tall enough for an ogre to walk through if it was open, and three could traverse it shoulder to shoulder without trouble.
It was plain and without any marking whatsoever to indicate that it was in such harsh desert elements.
Dracos
Darx races up the stairs, with no regard for his teammates at all, and pauses, staring up at the door.
"This is it..." he whispers, running a hand over the warm steel and smiling. He closes his eyes a moment and chuckles.
"And they said we would all perish if we came here....I feel nothing threatening in the air here. Fools."
The winged man opens his eyes, and quickly grabs the door handle, giving it a sharp pull to try and open it.
There was no handle.
In fact, the door was not warm at all, but deathily cold, a grim chill filling the air as Darx found himself thrust back off the stairs and to the sands below. The gateway twisted, it's steel center warping and distorting as it pushed forward into a grim and monsterous face.
The air shook as the face intoned, the metal twisting and groaning with the motion.
IT IS NOT TIME
Dracos
"Time? Time for what?" whispers Mei-Ling, hands hanging limply at her sides. "Who would have thought.. the tower can communicate."
The ground shuddered and shook.
THE WAY IS LOCKED
Dracos
Mei-Ling steadies herself, feeling for the spirits of the earth, trying to soothe and calm them from their groans and moans.
Leets stared warily at the monumental face as it intoned its warning to their party. He could feel voice rumbling through his very bones as the chill of death wafted over them.
"Okay, guys, I thought I got used to the wasteland weirdness, but apparently I was wrong," he said, keeping an eye on Darx incase he did something else foolish.
Like unleashing Farnham's demons.
Or worse.
He pulled over his goggles, using their dark lenses to check the sun's position in the sky and gauge how much time was left in the day.
"Will he try to force the door?" says Mei-Ling, staring. "That tower.. it's alive, or worse.."
Leets:
It was a little past noon.
Dracos
"Hmph. So much for that." Jan walked up, shielding his eyes as he looked at the tower's entrance. He could almost physically feel the menace this building was putting out, skin chilling in the bright day.
He looked over to Mei-Ling curiously. "What an odd place to meet a stranger. Why are you here?" Turning back to the tower, he continued. "I guess we should get the heck out of here or piss that building off."
"Well, as interesting as this little detour has been, I should be going now if I want to make it to Vault City," Leets said, taking his goggles off after he finished checking the time.
"Are any of you coming or should I just meet you someplace else?"
"I'll go to Vault City too. I have something I want to check up on there." Jan responded to Leet's request, lightly shrugging his pack slightly higher up on his shoulders.
ONLY BEARING THE STAR OF HEAVEN MAY ONE ENTER
The door intoned as the face blended away to nothing.
Dracos
Leets blinked, watching the face melt back into the door with an oppressive silence.
"What's this 'Star of Heaven' it was talking about?" he asked no one in particular.
"I'd ask if we really want to find it." Jan responded easily, even as his mind began working overtime, neurons firing rapidly as he pieced together snippets of memory. "Doesn't seem very smart to unleash those horrors on the world at large."
"You have a point there."
He glanced again at Darx, who was still at the Tower's entrance before turning his attention to Jan again. "Well, we should get going if we want to make it to Vault today."
So saying, he started the long hike to their next destination.
Darx grits his teeth, slowly backing away from the tower.
"Damnit....I should have known it'd be locked."
He turns and chases after the group. "We need to find this star it's talking about."