Bowman Bastion

[thewatchers]

BOWMAN BASTION
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With the impending end of the world, it would be quite foolish indeed for the governments of the world to stand by and do nothing. And while that may be the expectation of the general populace, there are some within the government that have been quietly allocating funds and resources to the Bastion Project - a globe-spanning initiative to save humanity’s remnants, should night fall.

The Bowman Bastion, located in Bowman County North Dakota near the town of Bowman, is one such construction. Meant to safeguard residents from the general areas of North Dakota, South Dakota, Eastern Montana, and Wyoming, the Bowman Bastion is an enormous underground megacity with huge tiers of housing and centrally located commerce zones. The entire community is supported by geothermal generators and an intricate network of air valves and filtration systems. As the world is coated in Outland Mist, the air network will filter the Mist out through specialized orichalcum ducts and ensure the populace is supplied with fresh air. Water is tapped from several basins above ground that will move through similar filtration systems before reaching the residents. Finally, food is supplied through immense hydroponic farms sustained by artificial light. The community itself makes heavy use of this self-same light in order to allow it to grow greenery within and keep oxygen properly circulating.

Immense and impressive, the Bowman Bastion is in fact one of the smaller bastions currently under construction. As night falls, there are plans to evacuate all citizens to these huge underground shelters, in hopes that Nightfall might be reversed, or, failing that, that the structures will remain defensible enough that humankind will not perish in its entirety.

The structures are indeed immense and wholly impressive, although those with a firm grasp of numbers will likely realize upon touring the facility that it is not nearly able enough to supply the entire area it is supposedly intended to cover. According to the wardens, it is expected a full third of the population in the area will choose to remain where they are instead of fleeing, with evidence borne out from studies of other disasters and human responses to them. Further questioning, of course, will lead nowhere. The Bastions are here to save as many people as they can. It’s just a question of how many that number truly is.

Not unlike previous encounters with those who haven’t been fully exposed to the supernatural side of things, the researchers and workers here are generally skeptical but curious to ask questions in order to understand both the motivations behind their new visitors and their range of knowledge. Advice and answers from Daybreak’s staff and students will likely change how things are handled here in months to come.

Comments

[adjectiveprince]

Zagreus seems simultaneously more comfortable and less happy to be here. He grew up underground, and for the first time since he came to the surface the air feels close to what he's used to. But the sky over his head, as strange as it still felt, was also a sign of his victory over his father. Being back underground felt like a step backwards.

At the moment, he was standing at one of the security check points, which was a steel door two inches thick, and he was trying to talk to the security personnel. They weren't taking his warning seriously.

Fed up, Zagreus grabbed the door and, with a grunt of effort, bent it in half with his bare hands. Which DEFINITELY got their attention, and also got a few guys shouting and pointing guns at him.

"This is what I've been trying to tell you, though! Against the kind of creatures you're trying to keep out, a door like this is not going to last for very long at all! I'm not even the strongest thing out there! Not by a long shot!"

[arcadianvampire]

Valvatorez heard the commotion from the door being bent like a piece of paper, and wandered over. He wore a glamor to keep his most daemonic traits hidden, mostly to avoid causing undue duress among the people here. After all, this place was supposed to be secure from daemons, and while he had no problem giving people reality checks, sometimes it was easier for them to take coming from something that looked more human.

He came onto the scene with the guards, weapons already drawn and shouting. The vampire cleared his throat, and spoke with a commanding, firm voice that while not aggressive, asserted a certain level of professional authority.

"Gentlemen, stand down. Zagreus here was illustrating an important point. And besides, do you really think your little peashooters would stop a man who just bent a metal barricade like that in half like it was nothing?" He walked closer to his fellow, so he could get a better look at the metal door. "The point is, if Zagreus meant you all harm, you would now already be dead. And everyone else in this shelter would soon follow."

His glamor form traded his sharp red eyes for a more chilling, pointed blue; one that could still deliver a withering stare, just in a different way.

"And he's just one. If the daemons came for this shelter, they will not come alone. You're going to need much more than just the strength of steel alone to keep them out."

[adjectiveprince]

"Don't oversell me, mate." He muttered, eyeing the guns. He would probably survive if all six of the guys with guns opened fire at once. Hell, he'd probably be able to disarm or kill them all. He definitely wouldn't enjoy the experience.

[arcadianvampire]

Valvatorez glanced back at Zagreus's comment, and he had to fight hard to suppress a genuine laugh.

"Oh, listen to you being modest," he replied, before shrugging, and taking the door into his own hands and turning it over to look more closely at the bend. "This is good form, and a pretty clean bend."

...Yes, this "normal" looking twig of a person holding an extremely heavy steel vault door like it was nothing. That earned some further agog looks from the security team that was facing them. Valvatorez then looked back at them, realizing that maybe he might've tipped his hand a little, but. Ah well, Daybreak had already proven themselves to be strange, but it didn't necessarily blow his cover as a daemon. Just someone absurdly strong.

"Remember, sirs, that the Nightfall is not some mere natural disaster. It is war. It is quite literally Armageddon should defenses fail. It will make World War II look like a pleasant picnic. You would do well to remember daemons are less like infantry, and more like a mass of heavy tanks. Two inches of steel won't stop a tank, and it won't stop a real daemon."

[adjectiveprince]

"I think Professor Valvatorez is more of an expert on daemons than I am. I'd say I'm a pretty qualified on breaking through unbreakable defenses, though. So here's what I would do if I was trying to keep me out."

They had the humans' attention by now, at least. Zagreus outlined a few ideas on how to improve the defenses up here, drawing on his least favorite parts of escaping the underworld and conferring with Valvatorez frequently. He wasn't sure if they were actually going to LISTEN to him, but he could at least say he'd made an effort to hold them out.

[unpocoloco]

It's a burial, some cruel part of his mind whispers. It's not a fair assessment. It's not even the fact that the place isn't beautiful-- in it's way, it is, and he can just imagine how it will look when (if) there's actual life here, decorating it top to bottom the way humans can't help to do. Lights and colors, maybe it will be like the city of his dream.

But it's underground, and he knows what it symbolizes. Further, he knows that not everyone will make it here. Not matter how big it is, it can't possibly be big enough for every single person. And it might not need to be.

He finds himself settled in amongst the growth, running his fingers over the leaves of the plants. He frowns.

"I can't decide if this is incredibly hopeful and promising or... bleak."

Somehow, he's always wrapped up in his own problems enough to forget the apocalypse.

[ofexperience]

"... Both, I'd say."

V's voice is quiet as he speaks, looking over some of the plants himself. "Promising in the moment, but bleak for the future." He's quiet for a few moments more. "I just hope this won't be needed, to tell you the truth."

[unpocoloco]

"Both," He repeats. Then he nods his head. He understands the man's quiet. The moment feels heavy.

"I really, truly, hope the same," He finds himself saying. "I keep wondering what they might have planned back home. If anything. If... if those I knew will be able to..."

He can't finish that thought. It terrifies him.

[ofexperience]

"As do I." He reaches over to run his thumb over the leaf of one of the plants.

He's not sure what state his hometown's in by this point, frankly, and some part of him doesn't want to know. He's not sure he could bear to think about his home not having anyone who can escape.

"My brother's probably going to be fine, but..." There's a bit of uncertainty. He stops, then shakes his head. "We need to make sure this won't be necessary."

[alreadyhuman]

"It's good they're ready? Maybe..." Vivi sounds a little unsettled. "But I dunno....it's really cold and weird. I don't know if I like it too much, but maybe I'm not supposed to..."

Vivi sticks close to Hector. He's uncertain, almost afraid, and that's easy to read.

[unpocoloco]

He looks up, mildly surprised to find Vivi there. He wishes he'd watched his tongue. Vivi's just a kid. And all of this is weighty.

He hears the fear in their voice, sees it on them, and he reaches out. First a hand for his, then an arm to wrap around them.

"It probably seems scarier now because it's empty. If people really need this, it's going to have all kinds. And they'll have each other. Like all of us at Daybreak we'll have each others backs."

[alreadyhuman]

"I guess..."

He blinks, when Héctor wraps an arm around him, but doesn't argue with it. It's easy to tell that he's trembling a little.

"..I hope we won't need it, though."

so late orz

[hawkwardness]

< Pretty impressive that they pulled it off. > He's nestled in the plants somewhere, taking a breather. It's unsettling. The still, dead air. The lack of windows. That's so hard to handle anymore, feeling cut off from the sky. It wasn't so bad a few months ago.

< I wonder if this is what it'd be like on a spaceship? A real one, traveling to another planet to live. > ...But at least he still has his nerdy love of scifi?

[unpocoloco]

He can't blame Tobias for hiding in the plants. If he wasn't done with getting all too close with the dirt, he'd be there too.

But Toby's comment about space draws a smile. He looks at it all again, considering that perspective.

"Maybe like a really futuristic one," He says. "I used to think that stuff was super fake. You know, back when the rest of this stuff was super fake. But hey, maybe that's how space ships will be in the far future. And this..." He laughs softly. "Yeah, it'd be like that. Travelling far, for a real long time, and then one day you open the doors and it's a whole new world."

A whole new Outlands filled world...

[hawkwardness]

The garden itself is so lifeless. He's a hawk, he can normally hear and see every living thing moving around in plantlife, right down to the hardworking ant colonies. This is nothing like nature. Bleak is the perfect word.

So what's he going to do about it? Pretend there's going to be a future? Fake it till he makes it and magically becomes an optimist? Sure. Whatever. < The stuff you read in books isn't anywhere near as fake as movies and TV shows. Lot more room for imagination when they're not working with crappy CGI. Anyway, that would be cool. I wonder if I'd be able to morph alien animals. >

[hawkwardness]

There's not a whole lot of advice he can give them. He's been to the Outlands and lived to tell the tale. He's even become one of the creatures that lives there. And with these eyes, he might be able to spot a few flaws in the plan to make it worth the trip.

But mostly he's here to satisfy his own curiosity. It might work. Maybe. The end of the world will still be terrible... and yet there's a tiny chance humanity won't go extinct. Later on in the visit he excuses himself for a short break to stretch his wings and clear his head, unnerved by the whole place for one reason that's fairly obvious, once one thinks about it.

< ...man, I don't know if I could live like this, without the sky. >

No. He couldn't. He'd be begging to be set free within the week, probably.

[stavros]

I agree... [She shifts uncomfortably.] I comend them for their dedication to saving the population, but we cannot let things reach the point where this is needed.

[hawkwardness]

< No. We can't. I mean, I made up my mind months ago, I'm in this until the end, but... >

[He resettles his winds, uneasy on his perch. Being underground and knowing there are no windows, he's cut off from the sky--it's gnawing on his nerves. The only reason he hasn't panicked yet is because it's a big underground cage, much bigger than a classroom.]

< This wouldn't be living. Just surviving. >

[stavros]

[Kokoro looks at the floor as people move with their supplies around them.]

It's always felt strange that Daybreak goes out of its way to let us have everything we could need. But something like this in contrast... Perhaps that's why they brought us here. To show us that even the best-case scenario should we fail is something we should take as unacceptable.

[alreadyhuman]

"I don't think I could live here either...it's really cold," Vivi says, his coat pulled tight even though the cold goes deeper than that. "It's big and kinda scary...I don't know if living here would make people happy."

[hawkwardness]

< Seems too small to me. Because this will be their whole world... for who knows how long. It could be forever. >

A terrible thought, enough to make his heart pound. No sunshine. No stars at night. No freedom. Death above their heads, between them and the sky.

< But I can't think of anything better, if... if we don't win. >

[alreadyhuman]

"Then we just gotta do that."

'Just', like it's that simple. But seeing this kind of thing, failure isn't even an option he wants to think about, because thinking about it might make it real somehow.

"I wonder what they'll be used for, though? After all this stuff is over and we don't have to worry about Nightfall anymore. Maybe people will just live in it like normal."

[ofexperience]

There's something unnerving about being underground like this. V's managed to pick out some vulnerabilities that weren't caught, and he'll have to bring those up, but... he doesn't like being here. He's taking his own break when he hears Tobias.

"I know exactly what you mean. This all seems horribly... bleak, somehow."

[hawkwardness]

< I know, and we've only been here hours. >

There's tension in his mental voice. Subtle, but it's there. The air's all but dead down in the Bastion. No currents, no breezes, nothing. One of the many things he dislikes about being indoors.

< Like I said to someone else, how are they going to stop people from losing it and trying to bust out? Or turning on each other? I mean, geez, cabin fever's an understatement. I don't think this little garden is going to be enough. >

[ofexperience]

V grimaces.

"It's certainly not. Even if it wasn't for the risk of descent into insanity..." He pauses, tapping his fingers against his cane. "... This place is nowhere near as large as it should be for this area. They say it's because some people will refuse to budge, but..." He's not so certain that's the entire reason. He's not sure he wants to think on what other reasons there could be.

"The intention is... good, but I'm sincerely hoping things won't reach this point."