Audio: no picture of Ellie is associated with the account

[fungi_notpunny]

Hi. I'm... Hunting and wilderness. [The voice is young and female, a vaguely midwestern US accent, who pointedly offers no name. She stutters every now and again, but tries to stay casual as she speaks.] Sorry about all the--overgrowth. This message is about all of that. Um.

The city is too big for me to really go around yelling all the plants off the buildings, but if it's cut down and--you know, regularly pruned--it shouldn't grow back so fast. Same with everything in the paths. If you have any bad mold growing or anything, you can, um, message me? I'll show up and get rid of it.

[She takes a deep, shaky breath.]

Okay. The other thing... I might have fucked up. I don't know yet. If you guys can keep an eye out for a type of fungus, or any spores, that would be helpful. They look anywhere between a sort of...pale yellow to a pale pink, sometimes just white, and the outside is sort of reddish-pink. It grows in plates, and it'll travel through tendrils when possible. They like water and damp stuff. Usually they grow from human bodies. If you see any, don't go near it, don't fuck with it. Just message me through this thing. More importantly, if you see any spores... well, you probably shouldn't fuck with them anyway, but especially not if the spores are whitish-yellow. A little won't do much, but if you start feeling dizzy, it's over. You can walk through them if you have a gas mask. [There's a pause for a few moments, and a shuffling that sounds like paper.]

These things are called cordyceps. They're a fungus that can infect people through the spores. When you're infected, you'll get sick and then become aggressive very quickly. It's...basically zombies.

I haven't seen any yet. If you do, though, be careful. The spores are nearly impossible to get rid of, but the plants themselves can be taken out with fire...or bleach. Probably.

There’s a certain stage in their life cycle where they start glowing in the dark, but I… don’t really know what stage it is. Also… there's no cure, at least not where I'm from.

Anyway... if you need to get in touch, I guess you can, um, comment here. Or message me.

[There is a hand drawn image of what is, presumably, a cordyceps plant attached to the message.]
(OOC: temple information and IC inbox. Characters will not find any of the cordyceps fungus around, for the time being.)

Comments

[11calls]

Wait. More zombie stuff? Seriously?

Audio

[fungi_notpunny]

Yeah, I know. CBI isn't sneaky, at least. But I think I'm the... third, from a world like that.

[11calls]

CBI is what the fungus is called? Like officially? When they need to abbreviate it, I mean.

[And Alex has a theory, that so many zombie worlds might have something to do with the fact that Chase was the first person to sit on a throne, so the worlds connected with death came first.]

[fungi_notpunny]

Yeah - the strain that changes people, anyway. Cordyceps Brain Infection.

...Oh, yeah. Some scientists passed it to monkeys, too. The little guys, not gorillas.

[11calls]

Well, that's one good thing I guess. A gorilla on the loose would be bad enough, but if you added in a zombie one.

[That's the sound of Alex shuddering.]

[fungi_notpunny]

The monkeys were bad enough. We found, um, a recording from this scientist - they were evacuating, but he felt bad for the animals and he decided to release them. He got bit and infected. It wasn't pretty.

[ichoosefight]

A zombie fungus.

[ Is it bad that that's really neat? ]

You've been in town though, right? What are the odds that you brought the fungus in and nobody's been affected yet?

Audio

[fungi_notpunny]

Someone said cordyceps from their world does the same thing, but to insects. I think it's the same idea.

[That's a difficult question, because even with Georgia and Shaun, Ellie isn't totally comfortable answering that question honestly. Still, she stitched up Joel with her bare hands, so she's probably not too infectious, right?]

I don't know. If it's because I took the throne, I don't think so. I've never lived in a place like this, and the forest is definitely different, so I don't think I brought anything new, but... better safe than sorry, right?

And I don't think I brought it myself. Even if I were a run--a stage one infected, I'd still have to bite people to turn them.

[Contrary to popular belief, Ellie doesn't enjoy biting people.]

Audio

[ichoosefight]

Weird.

[ Yeah Steph doesn't know anything about fungus or insects. Oh well. ]

So the odds are pretty in our favor? I'll keep an eye out, but we don't need to like, run a survey of the population or anything?

[fungi_notpunny]

Yeah. Just keep an eye out and be careful when you to into basements, shit like that.

[ichoosefight]

Thanks for the heads up, oh Huntress. I'll take the proper precautions and check out what I can.

[Text]

[justanitgirl]

Zombie making spores. If found,
don't touch. Got it.

How, exactly, did this happen anyway?

text

[fungi_notpunny]

The zombie apocalypse from mushrooms? No idea. I was born after the outbreak.

Re: text

[justanitgirl]

I was talking about them being here, but yeah, a zombie apocalypse from mushroom is pretty weird.

text

[fungi_notpunny]

They might not be. The plants started going crazy here after I took the throne, which is what it's like in my world. So if that happened, why not the fungus?

Re: text

[justanitgirl]

Fair, but maybe they just missed having someone around?

[dislikeable]

You're Hunting? ❰ she's still not entirely sold on referring to themselves by the thrones they supposedly sit on, especially considering she's yet to see if this god of hunting is any better at hunting than katniss herself is, but. she's not going to stir the pot right now. instead: ❱ Then you'd know the best spots for game. ❰ right? because katniss wants to know. ❱

audio

[fungi_notpunny]

I'd rather not give my name and face out to everyone.

[That's one of the advantages here - Ellie doesn't have to meet people to talk to them, and they don't have to know exactly who she is. She sounds young, but the goddess of hunting sounds more impressive than Ellie, the fifteen year old kid.

Ellie's good - but her skills were shaped by desperation, not long years of practice.]

Um, right now it's mostly small prey animals. There are a few jackrabbits near those crops to the south-east... and lots if squirrels and rats. I haven't seen anything bigger yet.

[dislikeable]

Rabbits are fine. They're good roasted, or in stew. ❰ and if the rabbits are near the crops, she might be able to nab some vegetables in the same place.

as an afterthought: ❱ Thank you.

[fungi_notpunny]

They aren't bad. [Sometimes hunting them freaks Ellie out, but the taste isn't too bad. Better than venison.] Yeah, no problem. Good luck.

Video - Private

[choosetruth]

[Georgia is going to very pointedly use video. She will make the feed private, but she's making a point here.]

Stop editing my spreadsheet and stop hiding, Ellie. This isn't a game. If you're going to take the kind of powers associated with being a deity, then you'd better fucking stand behind them. Especially if your screw-ups could lead to this level disaster.

obstinate audio

[fungi_notpunny]

Fuck off, asshole. That's why I did this. People know how to get a hold of me and that's all they fucking need, so take my name off the goddamn spreadsheet and I'll stop editing it.

video forever

[choosetruth]

[She'll stop editing it anyway. Anonymous editing's been revoked and this account is now blocked :|

Georgia wants to keep yelling. She probably will keep yelling. But Ellie's a child. She ought to at least attempt patience first. Not that Georgia's excessively good at it.]

Why do you want to be anonymous? What are you afraid of?

>[

[fungi_notpunny]

[Well, she'll just...

...

do nothing, probably?? Ellie can barely work the tablet, much less figure out how to get around being blocked.]

Does it really matter?

[The honest answer is that Ellie has no idea. She's just fucking scared of everything. It's better here than back home, sure, but she doesn't like the idea. She just wanted to help for once, but she fucked up maybe and she doesn't know how to fix it, and everyone wants so much more than she wants to give.

(It's about the power. Whether to give her name or not is the one fucking thing she has control over these days. It's the one thing she can decide to give or take as she pleases, when she feels like there are so few choices in her life. Of course, being the goddess of hunting helps, but it doesn't shake old habits, ingrained in Ellie like fractured glass.)]

Just take it down. That's all I'm fucking asking, alright?

[choosetruth]

It does matter.

[The fact that she sounds like a scared kid now makes it slightly more likely she'll do it. Despite the reputation she's carefully built, Georgia Mason does have a heart, and she knows how hard it can be, growing up around the dead. She can't fault the kid for being paranoid. Georgia is too. She just has different ways of dealing with it.]

Look. If what you're afraid of is retribution for your choices, there's no way I'm taking it down. Holding powerful people accountable is my job. If there's something else...

[She hesitates, then nods sharply.]

I'd consider it. But I won't forget.