November 12, 2019 • 15 mins
Chaos erupts on Atlas Station and Synøve Pan is thrust into the very center of the conflict.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Following a production of my R rating of this episode
contains depictions of drug use and strong violence. A second
oil age. They were Veil's eyes. If they'd been gaping
(00:39):
sockets or coal red depths, perhaps I'd have reacted faster.
But it was her. It felt like her, despite the
brutality of her acts, despite the mist of blood still
wafting through the air. It stood by the shattered tank,
and for a moment I was frozen to the spot,
(01:01):
paralyzed by the impossibility playing out before me. Don't you
want to hear it it? She moved and I pierced
her right shoulder with my ready throwing knife. As the
weapon exited through her back, I lunged and spun round
with the other blade. With so much basilisk in my system,
(01:24):
there was no holding back. I'd seen what she was
capable of. The veil Thing leapt over my sweeping slice,
and I felt a sharp kick to the small of
my bath. I ducked and rolled with the impact across
the bloodied tiles. I popped up and plucked my knife
from the wall. The hilts was slick with amber liquid.
(01:49):
What are you? The veil Thing sprinted onto the room
small stage and ripped the curtain aside. I let fly
with another knife and watched it cut clear through her
lower back. Unfazed, she launched herself up at a sealed
maintenance conduit near the ceiling and tore it open with
one hand, then poured herself through. I dashed after her.
(02:13):
I heard shouting behind me in the mess hall, but
I didn't look back. I leapt up and grabbed the
edges of the conduit, heaving myself into the narrow shaft.
I scrambled after her, following the twisting coils of wires
and cables slithering through the trail of viscous amber that
she bled in her wake. I rounded a corner and
glimpsed her up ahead. I had one knife in hand,
(02:36):
but the space was too confined for a throw, so
I crawled as fast as I could, like some burrowing
animal in pursuit of its prey, until the bottom suddenly
gave out beneath me. I fell through an access hatch
and into a dive chamber. The basilisk gave me the edge.
I landed in a crouch, knife ready, and looked up
(02:59):
to see three you deck security guards with squid guns
leveled a fourth manipulated a communit. Jack's stood front and center,
the cranium recognition scanner on her weapon taped as always freeze,
drop the knife. You have to listen. What have you done.
There's a journalist, a thing that looks like a stowaway
(03:21):
from the Gladius. One of the airlock hatches open behind
them with a frothy wash of deep pressurized seawater. The
guard with the communit was the only one to notice
the form rising behind them. Its skin was matt but
slick with the sea scaled and tight with ropy musculature.
(03:43):
It rose to nearly seven feet, and the formations on
its skull gave its silhouette the appearance of a thorny crown.
It closed one great webbed hand over the top of
the nearest guard's head and twisted his skull around like
a bottle cap. Jack's fired on me. Without the drug,
(04:05):
that would have been it. I'd have choked to death
there on the floor while the guards attended to their attacker.
But my reflexes were just sharp enough. I shot my
left forearm up and shielded my face from the bulk
of the squid. The impact still sent me flailing backwards.
The metagel instantly bolowed around me at its four corners,
(04:28):
pinning me to the wall and my forearm against my face.
But at least I could breathe. All I could see
was their feet. I heard their cries. My first thought
was the knife still gripped in my pinned hand, and
whether I'd be able to saw through the squid in time.
Then I heard Jack's cry out in pain, and her
(04:51):
squid guns slid across the floor to my feet, just
within reach. I strained out, first one foot, then both,
attempting to scissor it up from the floor. My neck
strained from the weight of my suspended body, but of
course the gel held tight. I nudged off one of
(05:12):
my shoes, and I've never felt so vindicated in my
hatred of socks. I slipped my toes around the trigger
guard and reeled it in. I felt the presence of
the triton. I smelled a thick odor of salt water
and sulfur rolling off it biology of the lightless depths.
(05:35):
I gripped the squid gun between my ankles and pulled
it up to my chest. I grabbed it with my
free arm and touched the side of the barrel to
the meadow gell. It liquefied, and I fell to the floor,
right at the creature's webbed feet and the twin curling
tentacles that clung obediently to its lower legs. I had
(05:55):
never seen one before, only sketches by a logical profiles,
never in the flesh, never this close. It loomed over me.
Now it lifted a talented hand, so I obeyed my training.
I looked up at its shadowed face. I burned into
(06:18):
it with the twin elder marks on my scalp and brow.
When it recoiled, I stood up and ripped away the
scarp as well to reveal the one on my throat.
The triton stumbled backwards, raising its claws to block the
side of my marks. You Dex guards lay heaped behind it,
(06:39):
surrounding the two open airlock hatches, like slaughtered lambs before
an altar. I dropped the squid guns pointed the black
tip of my knife at the retreating creature. My name
is Snopon and I'm a licensed Udex agent. I invoke
ambassador status in the terms of the Oceanic's accord. That's
(07:00):
the second trite and grabbed me from behind. The world
went dark beneath the webbing of its great hand. Another
grabbed the wrist of my knife hand before I could counter.
Then the creatures twin tentacles guong suspected to aid and
propulsion alone, wrapped themselves around my legs. I thrashed in
(07:20):
its grip but could find no purchase. I screamed into
the muffling palm until voice and consciousness failed me. Does
the ocean cool to you? If so, consider a career
(07:40):
on the you Dex Deep Grid. Your hard work will
help maintain the crucial sea floor infrastructure necessary to fuel
our non combined and recombined people. Alike Phil Key roles
both inside pressurized habitats and at large in the breath
taking world of Earth's ocean depths. I wanted to see
(08:03):
the world and do my part to keep it running,
so I joined up as a systems manager. Thanks you Rex.
It's hard to fit in on the surface, but down
here my GMO status qualifies me for specialized, high paying
work in some of the world's most unique environments. Thanks
for you you Dex. Through the use of the d grid
(08:25):
system and patented proty as well and sulb see Templar
Technology GTT. We were able to safely harvest the Earth's
deepest petroleum riches without endangering ocean or inland environments. You're
the flame, we provide the fuel. You dex petroleum. Welcome
to the second oil Age. Thanks again for such a
(08:57):
lovely evening, Greg, You're the one who made it lovely. Wendy,
I just haven't felt so at ease with anyone in
a long time. Do you want to come up for
a nightcap? WHOA stop right there? Don't you think you
should know what you're getting into? What do you mean?
Sex is God's holy method of reproduction, and reproduction is
(09:18):
all about genetic combination, So don't you think you should
know what sort of genes you're combined in with. We're
just getting to know each other. Plus neither of us
has an our CEO tattoo. There's only one way to
be certain, and that's with jen No Whit. The leading
on site real time genetic tester is fully compatible with
off calm units, and it provides discrete answers in the
(09:41):
streets all between the sheets. I'm sorry, Wendy, I had
a great time, but I'm not really feeling it. Maybe
I'll see you at church with jen no wit You'll
know when? Did you know it is not intended to
supersedi with question standard federal and international our SEPUL registration laws.
Do you know what there's a subsidient of spiritual technologies?
How else? Yeah, I don't know what happened next. The screaming,
(10:13):
the chaos, It all felt distant to me. Scaled arms
carried me through the halls of Atlas. A webbed hand
masked my markings from my abductors and blinded me to
the world. I breathed, and the world around me grew faint.
At some point I stopped struggling. I dreamt my old life,
(10:43):
strung out, thrown out of the service on a bad
conduct discharge, my only home some promised cell in a
Midwest religious compound where my mother claimed God was still speaking.
I stood in front of the featureless black cube that
was the Apathis building, all my belongings stuffed into a
(11:06):
patch covered duffle, and I begged it to swallow me.
The doors of Apathos opened wide, and inside the shadowed
saint beckoned me enter. Black smoke pouring from her mouth
like deep bent it self bide no pleasure will be
(11:27):
denied it. During the treatment paper exposia, they divined with
tilted destruction key eviable nets. I felt myself lowered into
the womblike embrace of a warm, viscous medium. Atlas Station
gave way to the warble of ocean waters just beyond
(11:49):
the skin of my containment. I dreamt myself swallowed by Leviathan, contained, preserved.
I wanted it to last forever, but outer clothing cut
from my body like an accident victim. My skin bared
(12:11):
to the cold airscations of the compandity to customize matrix.
It is no other way. I don't know how much
time passed, but I woke to feel byzantine spirals of
(12:32):
embossed stone beneath me. I moved my fingers over the
stone's surface and traced the endless coils. I opened my
eyes and beheld the pomegranate glow of bioluminescent orbs. They
seemed to float in the air above me, beneath a
(12:53):
high domed ceiling scarred with the same coral like spirals,
an illegible alien tongue inscribed in the bones of the earth.
I was no longer on Atlas I was somewhere below
(13:25):
breaking Great Great, Green, Break, Green Yeah. The second oil
(13:54):
age was produced by Robert Lamb, Alex William Slouren Vogelbaum,
and Josh Thain. This episode featured Angel Masters as Senov Pon,
Lauren Vogelbaum as Tabitha Vale, and Annie Reese as Jack's
supporting voice. Work by Tracy V. Wilson, Ramsay, Junt, Gina Rakiki,
Nicholas Dakowski, Matt Frederick and Ben Bolan intro altro and
(14:19):
supporting music created by the Weirding Module. Learn more at
Module five dot band camp dot com. Music for the
Genoit media segment, So Long solaris by Jacob Tutu, provided
by King de Luxe Records. Learn more at King de
Luz dot c. A from our podcasts from IRN Radio,
(14:55):
visit the ir Radio app, Apple Podcasts or whinner We
listen your favorite shows
Following a production of my R rating of this episode
contains depictions of drug use and strong violence. A second
oil age. They were Veil's eyes. If they'd been gaping
(00:39):
sockets or coal red depths, perhaps I'd have reacted faster.
But it was her. It felt like her, despite the
brutality of her acts, despite the mist of blood still
wafting through the air. It stood by the shattered tank,
and for a moment I was frozen to the spot,
(01:01):
paralyzed by the impossibility playing out before me. Don't you
want to hear it it? She moved and I pierced
her right shoulder with my ready throwing knife. As the
weapon exited through her back, I lunged and spun round
with the other blade. With so much basilisk in my system,
(01:24):
there was no holding back. I'd seen what she was
capable of. The veil Thing leapt over my sweeping slice,
and I felt a sharp kick to the small of
my bath. I ducked and rolled with the impact across
the bloodied tiles. I popped up and plucked my knife
from the wall. The hilts was slick with amber liquid.
(01:49):
What are you? The veil Thing sprinted onto the room
small stage and ripped the curtain aside. I let fly
with another knife and watched it cut clear through her
lower back. Unfazed, she launched herself up at a sealed
maintenance conduit near the ceiling and tore it open with
one hand, then poured herself through. I dashed after her.
(02:13):
I heard shouting behind me in the mess hall, but
I didn't look back. I leapt up and grabbed the
edges of the conduit, heaving myself into the narrow shaft.
I scrambled after her, following the twisting coils of wires
and cables slithering through the trail of viscous amber that
she bled in her wake. I rounded a corner and
glimpsed her up ahead. I had one knife in hand,
(02:36):
but the space was too confined for a throw, so
I crawled as fast as I could, like some burrowing
animal in pursuit of its prey, until the bottom suddenly
gave out beneath me. I fell through an access hatch
and into a dive chamber. The basilisk gave me the edge.
I landed in a crouch, knife ready, and looked up
(02:59):
to see three you deck security guards with squid guns
leveled a fourth manipulated a communit. Jack's stood front and center,
the cranium recognition scanner on her weapon taped as always freeze,
drop the knife. You have to listen. What have you done.
There's a journalist, a thing that looks like a stowaway
(03:21):
from the Gladius. One of the airlock hatches open behind
them with a frothy wash of deep pressurized seawater. The
guard with the communit was the only one to notice
the form rising behind them. Its skin was matt but
slick with the sea scaled and tight with ropy musculature.
(03:43):
It rose to nearly seven feet, and the formations on
its skull gave its silhouette the appearance of a thorny crown.
It closed one great webbed hand over the top of
the nearest guard's head and twisted his skull around like
a bottle cap. Jack's fired on me. Without the drug,
(04:05):
that would have been it. I'd have choked to death
there on the floor while the guards attended to their attacker.
But my reflexes were just sharp enough. I shot my
left forearm up and shielded my face from the bulk
of the squid. The impact still sent me flailing backwards.
The metagel instantly bolowed around me at its four corners,
(04:28):
pinning me to the wall and my forearm against my face.
But at least I could breathe. All I could see
was their feet. I heard their cries. My first thought
was the knife still gripped in my pinned hand, and
whether I'd be able to saw through the squid in time.
Then I heard Jack's cry out in pain, and her
(04:51):
squid guns slid across the floor to my feet, just
within reach. I strained out, first one foot, then both,
attempting to scissor it up from the floor. My neck
strained from the weight of my suspended body, but of
course the gel held tight. I nudged off one of
(05:12):
my shoes, and I've never felt so vindicated in my
hatred of socks. I slipped my toes around the trigger
guard and reeled it in. I felt the presence of
the triton. I smelled a thick odor of salt water
and sulfur rolling off it biology of the lightless depths.
(05:35):
I gripped the squid gun between my ankles and pulled
it up to my chest. I grabbed it with my
free arm and touched the side of the barrel to
the meadow gell. It liquefied, and I fell to the floor,
right at the creature's webbed feet and the twin curling
tentacles that clung obediently to its lower legs. I had
(05:55):
never seen one before, only sketches by a logical profiles,
never in the flesh, never this close. It loomed over me.
Now it lifted a talented hand, so I obeyed my training.
I looked up at its shadowed face. I burned into
(06:18):
it with the twin elder marks on my scalp and brow.
When it recoiled, I stood up and ripped away the
scarp as well to reveal the one on my throat.
The triton stumbled backwards, raising its claws to block the
side of my marks. You Dex guards lay heaped behind it,
(06:39):
surrounding the two open airlock hatches, like slaughtered lambs before
an altar. I dropped the squid guns pointed the black
tip of my knife at the retreating creature. My name
is Snopon and I'm a licensed Udex agent. I invoke
ambassador status in the terms of the Oceanic's accord. That's
(07:00):
the second trite and grabbed me from behind. The world
went dark beneath the webbing of its great hand. Another
grabbed the wrist of my knife hand before I could counter.
Then the creatures twin tentacles guong suspected to aid and
propulsion alone, wrapped themselves around my legs. I thrashed in
(07:20):
its grip but could find no purchase. I screamed into
the muffling palm until voice and consciousness failed me. Does
the ocean cool to you? If so, consider a career
(07:40):
on the you Dex Deep Grid. Your hard work will
help maintain the crucial sea floor infrastructure necessary to fuel
our non combined and recombined people. Alike Phil Key roles
both inside pressurized habitats and at large in the breath
taking world of Earth's ocean depths. I wanted to see
(08:03):
the world and do my part to keep it running,
so I joined up as a systems manager. Thanks you Rex.
It's hard to fit in on the surface, but down
here my GMO status qualifies me for specialized, high paying
work in some of the world's most unique environments. Thanks
for you you Dex. Through the use of the d grid
(08:25):
system and patented proty as well and sulb see Templar
Technology GTT. We were able to safely harvest the Earth's
deepest petroleum riches without endangering ocean or inland environments. You're
the flame, we provide the fuel. You dex petroleum. Welcome
to the second oil Age. Thanks again for such a
(08:57):
lovely evening, Greg, You're the one who made it lovely. Wendy,
I just haven't felt so at ease with anyone in
a long time. Do you want to come up for
a nightcap? WHOA stop right there? Don't you think you
should know what you're getting into? What do you mean?
Sex is God's holy method of reproduction, and reproduction is
(09:18):
all about genetic combination, So don't you think you should
know what sort of genes you're combined in with. We're
just getting to know each other. Plus neither of us
has an our CEO tattoo. There's only one way to
be certain, and that's with jen No Whit. The leading
on site real time genetic tester is fully compatible with
off calm units, and it provides discrete answers in the
(09:41):
streets all between the sheets. I'm sorry, Wendy, I had
a great time, but I'm not really feeling it. Maybe
I'll see you at church with jen no wit You'll
know when? Did you know it is not intended to
supersedi with question standard federal and international our SEPUL registration laws.
Do you know what there's a subsidient of spiritual technologies?
How else? Yeah, I don't know what happened next. The screaming,
(10:13):
the chaos, It all felt distant to me. Scaled arms
carried me through the halls of Atlas. A webbed hand
masked my markings from my abductors and blinded me to
the world. I breathed, and the world around me grew faint.
At some point I stopped struggling. I dreamt my old life,
(10:43):
strung out, thrown out of the service on a bad
conduct discharge, my only home some promised cell in a
Midwest religious compound where my mother claimed God was still speaking.
I stood in front of the featureless black cube that
was the Apathis building, all my belongings stuffed into a
(11:06):
patch covered duffle, and I begged it to swallow me.
The doors of Apathos opened wide, and inside the shadowed
saint beckoned me enter. Black smoke pouring from her mouth
like deep bent it self bide no pleasure will be
(11:27):
denied it. During the treatment paper exposia, they divined with
tilted destruction key eviable nets. I felt myself lowered into
the womblike embrace of a warm, viscous medium. Atlas Station
gave way to the warble of ocean waters just beyond
(11:49):
the skin of my containment. I dreamt myself swallowed by Leviathan, contained, preserved.
I wanted it to last forever, but outer clothing cut
from my body like an accident victim. My skin bared
(12:11):
to the cold airscations of the compandity to customize matrix.
It is no other way. I don't know how much
time passed, but I woke to feel byzantine spirals of
(12:32):
embossed stone beneath me. I moved my fingers over the
stone's surface and traced the endless coils. I opened my
eyes and beheld the pomegranate glow of bioluminescent orbs. They
seemed to float in the air above me, beneath a
(12:53):
high domed ceiling scarred with the same coral like spirals,
an illegible alien tongue inscribed in the bones of the earth.
I was no longer on Atlas I was somewhere below
(13:25):
breaking Great Great, Green, Break, Green Yeah. The second oil
(13:54):
age was produced by Robert Lamb, Alex William Slouren Vogelbaum,
and Josh Thain. This episode featured Angel Masters as Senov Pon,
Lauren Vogelbaum as Tabitha Vale, and Annie Reese as Jack's
supporting voice. Work by Tracy V. Wilson, Ramsay, Junt, Gina Rakiki,
Nicholas Dakowski, Matt Frederick and Ben Bolan intro altro and
(14:19):
supporting music created by the Weirding Module. Learn more at
Module five dot band camp dot com. Music for the
Genoit media segment, So Long solaris by Jacob Tutu, provided
by King de Luxe Records. Learn more at King de
Luz dot c. A from our podcasts from IRN Radio,
(14:55):
visit the ir Radio app, Apple Podcasts or whinner We
listen your favorite shows
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