PERC Presents: Tell Me A Story!

Hey Triumph, I want you to tell me a story!

This is a complete forum based event, but if you so desire you can give me a screenshot of the character you wish to tell me about.

Here are the objectives:

-Pick a character of yours.
-Write the beginning story of that character.
-USE YOUR IMAGINATION, no real life story of how you created them.
-You may not use any slang or internet lingo; unless you are using it in a conversation.
-No longer than 1500 words
-Punctuation and grammar count!
-You may write in any Point of View! (1st, 2nd, or 3rd.)
-Be creative, it can even be in journal entry form to look a bit more realistic!

Prizes:
1st place gets 100mil influence
2nd place gets 60mil influence
3rd place gets 40mil influence.

FAQS:
How to send in an entry?

Just post it on here. As well as a screenshot if you desire! Those wishing to submit a private entry may PM it to me.

How will it be judged?

Each Reader will read and score your entry using a basic story rubric. Then each judge’s total score will be totaled for the final score.

When they are due?

October 15th , 2010

Lol - in before Cancer.

Nice to see some contest on Triumph. I was about to give up on this server. Count me in too.

I'll look forward to the entries. Also for future events I am always open to public suggestion.

So far we have 2 participants no PM's of any other entries as of yet. This will be an easy event if I only have 2 stories to judge. Tell your friends, and SG mates to enter the contest for some good free in game influence.

Triumph isn't populated enough to get events going like on other servers. I think is because those who play on Triumph are casual players, solo players, and otherwise friends that keep to themselves. The majority of which are veterans so I'm not too far off when I say 100mil may not be enough incentive for them. For a new player like me even third prise more than enough. Plus I don't think the forum gets watch much by those in game but the few you see on the boards.

Anyway, working on my story.

It's a little piecemeal from the character's past and present incarnations, but I've been spending the past couple of days rewriting it and I'm spent, so here it is.

Word count: 1459


December 1999

“The angels…yes… there is much in store for you yet WHELP!” The Seer reached up, grabbed the gargoyle’s “regal” horns and bent them downwards as a mark of servitude. The gargoyle howled in searing pain.

As he gripped the rail, the memory of a millennium ago rang in his head. The words were spoken to the gargoyle in an age long since past, when he still protected the Masters, his makers, from their dread enemies.

He was a fool for not seeing it earlier.

Los Angeles.

Gabriel, an elder immortal and the gargoyle’s centuries-long mentor, had asked for Obsidius’ assistance in his new territory, and he had agreed.

Gabriel was an idealistic man. In his hopes to break the shadowy stranglehold the vampiric underworld had around the world’s shrinking energy supply, Gabriel had teams of scientists pour over theories to harness power from the universal fabric to create black-hole energy. Obsidius promised to secure the experiment against any attack from Gabriel’s opposition, using his magic to disguise himself in a more “human” appearance.

Obsidius had failed. The attack was massive, and began right after the reactor’s test activation. The black ops team of Gabriel’s vampiric rivals had done their best to demolish the project. Unfortunately, they had also destroyed the containment field generator in the process, unaware of the consequences.

Now the “spatial reaction” was out of control. It had grown from a small, controlled reaction to an enormous “rip in the fabric of space-time” – or so one of the scientists yelled before he was swept into the oblivion of the black, swirling anomaly, along with anything else not nailed to the floor or gripping the safety rails. And as the claxons rang, it started to take the walls of the lab with it. Obsidius clung to the railing, almost able to touch the emitter self-destruct button mounted on the wall.

And then the rail snapped under the weight of the quarter ton gargoyle. Obsidius was pulled into the vortex, into the void. His vision blurred as he became incorporeal; it was as if his body had turned to putty and was now being extruded into unnatural shapes.

At first, there was nothing.

Then Obsidius entered the nebulous void between universes and dimensions. Space, time matter, none of these things had any meaning. Yet a voice spoke to him, ominously.

“OBSIDIUS, WHAT IS YOUR GOAL?”

“Who are you? Where am I?” Obsidius replied…. or at least thought he replied.

“WE ARE THE ENTITIES. WE ARE THE FABRIC OF REALITY. WHAT IS YOUR GOAL?”

Obsidius could not deny his nature as a gargoyle. “I wish to safeguard my allies. I wish to return to my world.”

“YOU DO MUCH IN YOUR WORLD, BUT YOU ARE UNABLE TO RETURN THERE. THE TAPESTRY OF YOUR REALITY UNRAVELS.”

“Unravels? Because of Gabriel’s damnable contraption?”

“HIS “CONTRAPTION” IS THE BEGINNING OF YOUR REALITY’S END. ALTHOUGH IT DOES NOT DESTROY YOUR WORLD, IT BEGINS A CHAIN OF EVENTS THAT RESULT IN ITS DESTRUCTION AND DISRUPTION OF NATURAL ENTROPY”

“But what of my fiends and allies? What of Gabriel and the others?”

“OF THEM, WE CANNOT SAY. SEVERAL THREADS FROM YOUR REALITY ARE REMOVED BEYOND THE NATURAL ORDER AND MUST BE REWOVEN, MUCH LIKE YOURS. THE BEINGS OF YOUR REALITY MADE A CONSIDERABLE MESS THAT REQUIRES OUR ATTENTION, AND CAREFUL CONSIDERATION IS MADE WITH EACH THREAD. YOU ARE FORTUANTE TO HAVE SUCH A RARE CHOICE.”

“What options do I have? I am a gargoyle, without allies or sanctuary. What shall you do? Drop me on some alien world, or on another Earth in the middle of Times Square? What shall they think of me there?” Obsidius retorted.

“DO NOT FORFEIT THIS OPPORTUNITY, OBSIDIUS. WE RARELY GRANT AN AUDIENCE TO BEINGS OF LOWER PLANES OF EXISTANCE. WE COULD LEAVE YOUR FUTURE ENTIRELY TO FATE, IF THAT IS YOUR WISH.”

The magnitude of it all was overwhelming. Gabriel’s machine had apparently led to Armageddon, and those who weren’t killed were floating through the void, like Obsidius. Some would have a choice, and others would be tossed to the hand of Fate.

Obsidius deliberated for an eternity. Finally, he asked, “And what if I accept your opportunity, Entities?”

“IF YOU WISH, WE CAN DELIVER YOU TO A NEW WORLD; TO A PLACE IN NEED OF SUCH A GUARDIAN AS YOU. BUT BE WARNED, TRANSUBSTANTIATION CAN BE UNKIND, ESPECIALLY ON UNNATURAL CONSTRUCTS SUCH AS YOU.”

“What chance have I of again seeing those whom I know from my past?” Obsidius queried.

“THE DIMENSIONAL TAPESTRIES ARE INNUMEROUS, OBSIDIUS. WITHIN THE PLANE OF TIME, WHAT HAS HAPPENED BEFORE CAN HAPPEN AGAIN, IN DIFFERENT TIMES AND PLACES… BUT THERE ARE NO GUARANTEES IN THIS UNIVERSE. HOWEVER, EVEN GIFTED MORTALS CAN HELP TO WEAVE FATE’S STRANDS”

Finally, Obsidius spoke. “I accept your offer, Entities. So be it”

“INDEED. PREPARE YOURSELF, OBSIDIUS. YOU MAY FIND YOURSELF CHANGED. THE LAWS OF MAGIC AND THE SUPERNATURAL VARY BETWEEN TAPESTRIES.”

*****

June 2003

Hell of a retirement, Michael thought to himself. The city, the world, had barely survived the Rikti. The citizens of the globe were still in shock after the estimated tally of those lost to the halted invasion, both civilian and “cape” casualties. Paragon had been hit the hardest, although it was Britain’s Hero 1 and his Omega Team who had sacrificed themselves in the end to save everyone.

The number of supers was miniscule at best. The Surviving Eight, the eight Paragon heroes who survived the war – including Michael – did what they could to help sort through the rubble. New capes, most of them kids answering the nation’s call for recovery aid, were coming to Paragon and registering with the FBSA every day. Those kids would need training, and Michael had volunteered to help. But before that could happen, Galaxy City would need to be fixed up.

Amid the drone of jackhammers, bulldozers and dump trucks, Michael continued to pick up pieces of an apartment building that had been blasted during the war, helping the civilian work crews in the city’s effort to repair, rebuild, and find anyone who was still MIA. He turned his dark-skinned, sunglasses-and-dust-mask-clad face towards the next large chunk of concrete, bent at the knees, and got a good grip on it with his powered gloves.

*****

Everything was black. The gargoyle could not move. He was buried. He tried to use his magic to meld with the rubble and crawl through it, but discovered he no longer had the ability to do so. He tried to unbury himself, but was pinned underneath concrete and girders.

He heard voices above, and machinery. The rubble started to move. Suddenly, a large section of concrete on top of him was removed, exposing him to the sun.

Obsidius weakly tried to shield his face from the sun – and then realized that he was not affected by the light. No longer having the magic to create his human guise, he uncovered his monstrous visage, and the blinding rays of sunlight warmed his face for the first time in ages.

A deep voice spoke to him. “Relax, friend, we’re here to get you out of this mess.” As his eyes refocused, Obsidius saw a dark-skinned man with mechanical gauntlets, who had lifted the slab of concrete off of him. The man turned around and threw the debris into a dump truck fifty feet away, which reverberated with the sound of taking the heavy load. The man seemed unconcerned by Obsdius’ appearance.

*****

Michael looked back at the creature he just uncovered under the debris. He punched up his comlink.

“Dispatch, I’ve got an MIA. A… gargoyle? Shiny, jet black, eight foot tall, give or take. Looks like his wings have been broken off”

A few seconds later, a female voice responded on the comlink. “Are you sure Brawler? That doesn’t match Gargoyle’s description at all”

“Not the Gargoyle, a gargoyle,” Michael clarified amid the jack-hammering in the background. He repeated his description to the PPD dispatch officer.

A moment went by. Finally, dispatch responded “… doesn’t match anything in the FBSA records. We’ll send agents to your location ASAP.”

“Gabriel?” The gargoyle groggily spoke to Michael, his jet black eyes cracked open.

“No, my name’s Michael” he spoke back to the creature. “Some people call me the Back Alley Brawler.”

He offered the gargoyle a gloved hand to help it out of the rubble. The creature accepted it and, dragging itself to its feet, replied, “I am called Obsidius.”

Although he didn’t know it yet, Michael had officially introduced his first new cape into Paragon City.

In time, Obsidius would grow his wings back, un-bend his horns through magic and determination, and become one of Paragon’s greatest guardians… but that is for another story.

Triumph is small enough that we can lol@anything :P Lol@rp, lol@pvp, lol@being dead, lol@19, lol@grey trying to be funny.


Really like that guy's comment about how a contest here means we're not dead though.

Also think one of our bigger problems is that not many actually read the forums... May want to mention this contest in tw. I've had to do the same with pvpec events, and even normal things like the pd "dev" events.

I plan to mention it when I get time from work, college and my kids to do it. I get little in game time.

Alright I've mentioned this event a few times on Triumph Watch 2.0 channel not sure if many people will enter.

I had a story written but it went with my old computer. If I can find where it was posted once a pon a time I will put it in. However like you Toxic I have very little time right now. Teaching school, school projects, pregnancy, busted knee, yeah it seems almost a normal fall for me

I'll have to drum up some more activity this week if I have time. Thanks for the entries so far.

Well three weeks left of this event/contest and still only one entry. I've shouted this out whe I am on in TW and nobody else has shown up on this forum. I can't give all three prizes to one person now can I

here ya go here's my entry.


RPers are taking over coh so now the amazing hero, I don't love lamp, has turned into a villain and become and cat gurl in order to attain money and free cyberz.


moneh plz

Hello Toxic! Im @Lord Ozi and i'll be sending in my entry in a few days.

This sounds like a lot of fun. I'm going to get something together and submit it for the contest.

Thanks for putting this together, Toxic! Hope you get a lot of good entries.

Thanks for entering Lord Ozi. Looking forward to the two new entries. Thanks for entering Astris. If this ends up turning out better than it started I'll be more likely to have forum events for Triumph a little more.

PC_guy that was well yeah .... short and um different.

Inferno Havoc,

Cancer keeps griefing mah farms. I bet he RPs in real life. Tam likes pie.

-Fin