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Whispers of the Kraken (Epilogue: Revelations of the Kraken)

CatastrophicFailure

By CatastrophicFailure
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billbobjebkirk

billbobjebkirk

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On 9/3/2016 at 6:58 AM, Goldensniper79 said:
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Sorry I don't know how to get the photos to work on their own so you gotta click the links!

CatastrophicFailures idea of the Cermian Gunship:

http://prntscr.com/cdn434

http://prntscr.com/cdn4xs

http://prntscr.com/cdn5cl

My idea of the Cermain Gunship:

http://prntscr.com/cdn5rs

http://prntscr.com/cdn62t

http://prntscr.com/cdn68z

While your design is certainly... interesting, I think I prefer CF's It has a very menacing design, like if an He-111, an Mi-24, and an A-10 had some horrific child.

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CatastrophicFailure

CatastrophicFailure

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10 minutes ago, Alpha 360 said:

how does that lump of junk fly? As far as I can tell, the wings along are about 25 tons each and all of the gun must be 10 tons altogether. I think you would need a skipper engine just to get it into the air. 

Well it doesn't technically "fly," it's just so ugly the ground repels it. :D

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lodger

lodger

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10 hours ago, CatastrophicFailure said:

Well it doesn't technically "fly," it's just so ugly the ground repels it. :D

Which gives us tremendous fuel efficiency and almost eliminates weight restrictions, as no engines are required. You, Sir, are a true genius! :D

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KSK

KSK

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On a semi-serious note, the beast is packing a nuclear reactor (rated output 1.21 Gw unless I miss my guess. :) ) Nuclear reactor plus air as reaction mass should give you plenty of oomph.

Also psychotic pointy-toothed, lightly glowing pilots but I'm sure that's just coincidental.

Edit: Or were you asking how the model flies? Pure skill can be the only answer to that. :)

 

 

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CatastrophicFailure

CatastrophicFailure

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11 hours ago, KSK said:

Edit: Or were you asking how the model flies? Pure skill can be the only answer to that. :)

Do not confuse skill with stubbornness. :D

Since it's drummed up so much interest (and because I spent way too much time on it when I should have been USPing), here's some better shots. This is the "cosmetic" model. The "flight" model with big lift fans and VTOL jets... doesn't actually fly. Like, at all.

UKLibgq.png

Couldn't get the "bulk" I wanted quite right. It's actually kinda dainty.

SPepxcr.png

Forgot to turn a couple of the Vulcans on here. :blush:

OTghA51.png

There is a real reactor buried in there from the Mk2 Expansion mod. In theory, to make it work in game, the reactor runs a cheaty power-to-fuel generator that feeds the stock engines, with just enough fuel on board to start. In practice, true to form the reactor just overheats and shuts down. :rolleyes:

RYO0BQQ.png

It does actually fly. Sorta. It's about as unstable as it's crew. With those big, drooping wings and tiny tail it wants to snap roll anytime you pull up. This ended the flight shortly after the pic.

fU73E47.png

Size comparison. The little VTOL is actually a joy to fly. Not much endurance but it turns on a time while still being very forgiving.

Bwlb6bO.png

ETA: I got carried away & threw them up on KerbalX. 

https://kerbalx.com/metalhead47/Ceriman-Gunship

https://kerbalx.com/metalhead47/KCPD-VTOL-Police-cruiser

The missing parts for the Gunship are from: 

 

 

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CatastrophicFailure

CatastrophicFailure

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Chapter 78: Old Friends

"Valentina! Please, come in, come in!"

It was an odd bit of formality at this point, she was already deep inside the palatial residence. Having been inside an actual palace before, she felt uniquely qualified to use the term and, well, this place might just be nicer. 

It had taken Valentina some time to actually find it, despite its size, after the bored-looking security guard at the main gate had let her right through. That... did seem odd. Anyway, she had then spent who knows how long wandering about fragrant manicured gardens and large, tinkling ponds filled with brilliant ornamental fish. When she finally found what she assumed was the front door, before her hand even reached the ornately carved hardwood slab it swung open silently on well-oiled hinges. 

The enormous Kerbal waiting behind had made her do a double take. He was as big as Igor, possibly bigger. He even looked like Igor... sort of. If Igor had been beaten as a kerbling until his face was a misshapen lump. But while Igor's grasp of language was remedial at best, this fellow didn't seem to speak at all. He had simply nodded, and motioned for Valentina to follow. 

So she did, noting the finely tailored cut of her guide's suit; it must have cost a fortune in material alone. He had led her through a veritable maze of expansive hallways and exquisitely furnished passages. Rich wood paneling, burnished metal ceilings, brilliant marble floors made of solid blocks that surely weighed thousands of kilograms; and everything polished to a mirror shine. Except for the things that weren't. Matte painted walls that highlighted the wood and brass, furniture with exotic leather upholstery to compliment the walls and floors, and aquariums seemingly everywhere one could be squeezed. That, too, seemed rather... odd. They were filled with all manner of beautiful and terrifying fishes and other sea creatures, but... Valentina never remembered Edmund having such a thing for aquatics. 

The huge... butler..? Assistant..? had shown her to a room in the heart of the house, and once again, the door opened before she'd had a chance to knock. 

"How long has it been?" Edmund Kerman now grinned. Valentina felt a tinge of shame that she had to force a smile onto her own face. Behind yellowed eyes spotted with red blotches, his face seemed to be a contour map of bruises. Dark, fresh ones overlaid faded browns and pale greys, like the surface of some macabre alien moon. 

"Too long, my friend," she said, offering a hand, "you are looking well," then winced.

Edmund stared at her outstretched right hand for an uncomfortable moment, then at his own, clad in a black leather glove. It didn't look... right. 

At length, he turned, "you'll have to forgive me," leaning heavily on a cane with his other gloved hand, he motioned her into what must be his office, "I... haven't quite been myself lately." He grunted as he moved, slowly, stiffly, "I see you've already met Arnold, there."

From the corner of her eye, Valentina saw the huge Kerb step forward... plugging the doorway as he did. The room was filled with a palette of subtle but unsettling odors. Something pleasant, to mask the astringent-like tang of hospital, and beneath that, barely perceptible, a scent like rot. The same lavish dark woods were here, but the textures seemed to make her eyes slide off when she looked. Strange brightly-colored fish covered in long spines bobbled in lazy circles in a long aquarium built into one wall. Against her chest, the Münstone was growing ever colder.

"Best assistant a Kerb could ask for," Edmund crept slowly along around an expansive wooden desk in the center of the room, "be lost without him," finally reaching the far side, Edmund leaned back against an upturned black leather chair and pressed a button. With a whir of motors and a long groan, it lowered him back into a seated position. 

"And you may dispense with the pleasantries," he said, laying his stiff right hand on the desk, "I look like sh--" his words decayed into a brief fit of coughing. 

"Please," he gestured, "have a seat."

"Edmund, what has happened to you?!" Valentina exclaimed as she sank into the offered chair. It was so soft it seemed to suck her in. 

"XKCD. Stage III. I'll spare you the gory details, suffice to say I wouldn't wish it on anyone," he grinned an awful grin again, "but I do believe I've stumbled upon a way out. But that's not why you're here."

He leaned forward and raised an eye... no, it didn't raise. It jiggled for a moment before falling limp, and another bruise bloomed before Valentina's own eyes. 

Edmund didn't seem to notice, "so... what can I do for you?"

She sensed Arnold's shadow looming over her, "um... is a matter of grave importance..."

"Grave, you say?" Edmund said, flatly. 

It was far too late for Valentina to heed the alarm bells that had been shrieking in her head since she'd arrived. Have to follow this thing through, wherever it goes. 

"On my last mission... in orbit, I saw something very large. Something I cannot find record of."

"Large, eh? Are you sure it wasn't..."

He looked at her. She looked at him. The blotchy hemorrhages in his eyes made the latter quite difficult. She swore they had shifted position. PЦTIЙS ЗДЯS, how could he even remain upright in his state?

"No, I guess you would know the space station," Edmund said at length, "standard equatorial orbit?" Valentina slowly nodded.

Edmund grinned, giving her the peculiar impression of flesh pulling apart inside a bag of skin, "well, let's find out." From somewhere, he produced a slim keyboard. Valentina couldn't see a monitor, it took her a moment to realize it was somehow built into the desk surface in front of him. He raised his mannequin-like right hand, then using his left, curled the fingers into a loose fist, with the index sticking out. With this, he picked slowly and deliberately at the keys. 

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

He frowned; she could almost hear flesh tearing, "nothing in the registry. Biggest thing the KSA has in orbit right now is the second stage of an old Isfjell test launch that didn't go quite right." 

He pushed they keyboard aside, "but you didn't really come all this way for that, did you?"

Valentina felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. She wondered if Arnold could see them. 

"Oh and I love what you've done with your hair," Edmund grinned that horrible grin again, the perfectly-trimmed mustache he had once been so proud of was nothing but scraggly stubble, now, "not an easy look but you make it work."

"Er, yes... thank you... um, the other matter," she stumbled at a cold blast from the Münstone, "your crew mate... from the Mün mission... Mister Billy-Bobrim--"

A hair fell from his lip as she watched, "damn shame what happened to him," Edmund nodded, "good kid. He's getting the best medical care money can buy. I've seen to that."

"Yes, well," the chill had worked its way to the base of Valentina's spine, now, "what I am trying to know is, what did happen to him?"

Edmund grinned wider than ever, and this time the skin at the corners of his mouth really did split open, "I'll show you."

Before Valentina could even tense, the hand was around her throat. Arnold's thick fingers clenched around her chin, neck, and shoulders, and his strength was incredible. She punched and kicked at him, but he might as well have been made of iron. PЦTIЙ, it didn't even feel like skin!

"Edmund," she gasped, "what are you doing?! We are friends..."

"You'll understand in a moment," he said, "you'll understand more than you ever wanted." Then, to his brute, "hold her."

She grunted as Arnold picked her up by her head and shoved her onto the desk, still trapped in his vice-like grip. Motors whirred and whined as Edmund's chair slowly rose. Valentina kicked backwards with both feet, driving them hard into her captor but he remained as immotile as a mountain. Holding himself up by the edge of the desk, Edmund crept toward her. She strained against Arnold's grasp, but couldn't move her head a millimeter. The Münstone flashed to ice beneath her dress as the hideous visage of her old friend filled her gaze. 

She could smell the stink of decay on his rasping breath. His face pressed closer. She couldn't avoid looking into those grotesque, stained eyes. Where the crimson blotches on his tarnished corneas touched his pupils, they ran up along the edges like bloody crescent Müns. She realized with horror that his eyes had no irises, that the yellowed scleras and hemorrhages just seemed to disappear into pools of darkness.

Closer, they came closer. Panic thrashed against her mind. Her feet scrabbled pitifully against the polished desktop. Any hand she raised was carelessly batted away like an errant insect. 

Closer, and closer still. His pupils seemed to fill her vision. Before her own eyes, the Mün-like moats of blood surrounding them began to collapse inward, falling down into their darkness in sanguine cascades. 

But not darkness anymore, not shadow. Nothing. Nothing.  Not blackness but nothing. Terror beyond comprehension filled Valentina as she stared down into two pools of nothing, that now seemed to swell... engulfing Edmund's  eyes until they were entirely consumed. She could feel them drawing her, pulling her into them... and within them, something else.

It came forward. Something alien, something other, picked at the surface of her mind, pried at it. She could feel its greasy tendrils slithering, searching for a rift... a way inside. And beyond... past the tendrils... past the presence... within that womb of nothing...

She wanted to scream, but had no mouth.

Edmund's mouth split in victory, "do you see?"

Edited by CatastrophicFailure
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Alpha 360

Alpha 360

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Now that was purely freaky. So the Kraken is nothing, since you said his eyes as pools of nothingness. That means the Kraken is just imagination, or does something else use the imagination to make kerbals fear the non-exsistent Kraken, like the bug or something?

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lodger

lodger

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1 hour ago, vsully said:

So I wonder... Is this the end? Does Valentina become part of the Kraken or go insane or something? If so....

;.;

Well, while the first part of "Whispers" takes place before the events in "Shadows", I think the story now develops at the same time as the final part of "Shadows". So I wonder if there is some connection between the two. I mean: just punch the beast in the face? Nah, come on ...

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KSK

KSK

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Well the ending to Shadows pulled no punches (physically and emotionally :) ), so I'm very much looking forward to seeing what CF does with Whispers. Although I suspect it will be distinctly dark, tending to grimdark. 

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CatastrophicFailure

CatastrophicFailure

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22 hours ago, Alpha 360 said:

Now that was purely freaky. So the Kraken is nothing, since you said his eyes as pools of nothingness. That means the Kraken is just imagination, or does something else use the imagination to make kerbals fear the non-exsistent Kraken, like the bug or something?

I think Edgas would tell you the Kraken is most certainly NOT imaginary :wink:

7 hours ago, Andem said:

His eyes, HIS EYES! :0.0:

Glad folks have not forgotten these absolutely important arc words. :D

Eye scream, you scream, we all scream... just lots & lots of screaming.

8 hours ago, KSK said:

Well the ending to Shadows pulled no punches (physically and emotionally :) ), so I'm very much looking forward to seeing what CF does with Whispers. Although I suspect it will be distinctly dark, tending to grimdark. 

Someone has studied the Rule of Middle Sequels. :sealed:

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vsully

vsully

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15 hours ago, KSK said:

Well the ending to Shadows pulled no punches (physically and emotionally :) ), so I'm very much looking forward to seeing what CF does with Whispers. Although I suspect it will be distinctly dark, tending to grimdark. 

But I want to know how Valentina would get away from Edmund, because in Shadows Edgas ended up killing Edmund when he did what he is doing to Valentina ("DO YOU SEE IT?!"), so Val obviously doesn't kill Edmund, and I feel like he doesn't intend to let her go as Val.

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vsully

vsully

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14 hours ago, CatastrophicFailure said:

Next couple of days, hopefully.  3000 words and counting. This one went a little... mad. Also, my work schedule changed so Tuesday's & Thursdays look like a wash for getting much done. :mad:

3K words? Woo! Looking forward to it, take your time!

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