Phase Q/Spring Leaf

You wake up. The fresh smell of coffee wafts in. Sitting on a patio, looking out over the veranda. Birds and butterflies wing about the garden. You collect your thoughts.

The Flowrisers have a bold plan, although surely doomed. The Triads have a solid political base, although they’re ready to crush everything, which could include you. And right now you’re sitting precariously in the balance.

Off in the distance, fires blaze. You know that your tranquility will only last so long here. You can see the tanks and the rockets blasting away at each other.

An idea pops into your head. Why not go to the tropics, and wait out the war? You know a transporter – if he’s still alive. You could sit on the sidelines while you heal.

A green light blinks. You look out at the warring forces. The light wasn’t that far away. But you threw away your voltager a while ago. Where is the light coming from?

You look around, but don’t see anything. Hm, maybe you just imagined the light. Back to planning. There’s a Caribbean island with good coconuts, and lots of bikinis. Sure sounding good—

The light blinks again. What the dark?

You look around. In the foreground are some large leaves from a tree overhanging the patio. Off in the distance, you see warfare out to the horizon. And in between, it’s basically just the garden and the neighbors.

Blink.

It feels like an uneven interval, not quite every ten seconds or so, but roughly that. You pull a leaf off the tree, and hold it out around a foot in front of you.

Blink.

There it goes again. You see the blink quite clearly, although the leaf is in front of your face. So, it must be something really close to you. Oh dark. Yet it still feels like it’s farther away.

Blink.

What can it be? You run through your memory banks but can’t think of anything that would behave like that.

Blink.

The bright green light doesn’t seem to have a particular pattern. However, it continues to blink intermittently.

Blink.

The light grows brighter. An explosion goes off in the background. You hardly even think of the battleground, as the green light continues to shine more powerfully.

Blink.

Now it looks like a laser. You turn your head slightly, to avoid getting the light straight in your eyes. The light grows even brighter, like staring at the sun.

Blink.

The light widens in area, as it continues to brighten. Soon it fills your focus, bleeding into your peripheral vision. The brilliant green light expands and explodes. A man seems to walk out from the brightly glowing halo, and speaks to you.

“You have some valuable information. We will protect you. Come with us.”

The light nearly blinds you, so that you can hardly make out more than the figure’s shape. Looks like a tall humanoid, wearing some kind of stylized body armor. Things seem to dart about in the background, although you can hardly see them against the bright green light, being more aware of them as a feeling. The figure reaches out to you.

• New Dawn
• System Lock

Phase Q: An interactive adventure.