Episode 1

Sieghart opened bleary eyes to a room of more than a dozen people. All different age groups but definitely adults. Sitting up trying to make sense of it all, blinking to adjust to the low-light of his surroundings.

The pale moonlight illuminating the gloomy pitch-black. Once his eyes had adjusted Sieghart noticed two people in military fatigues standing off to the side holding guns. Both of them, hard faced and with graying hair.

Standing surveying the room, and checking dead phone lines, as the people started to stir, two minutes after a pop-up showed up.

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Player ???: Sieghart Valunheim

???

Main Mission: Survive

Difficulty: Tier 8-C+

World: Marvel Universe

Time Limit: One Month

Side Missions:

? ? ? ….

Points: Pending

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Everyone looked confused and the people holding guns weren't helping.

The room was a massive laboratory, with ceiling high windows, desks and lab equipment scattered about. There were even hazard symbols to the sides for danger. There was one door leading out to the hallway shrouded in darkness.

We heard footsteps echoing from beyond the doorway, then into view came a very classy shoe, attached to it were velvet pants, way too many forest-green belts a number of them more for fashion that holding up his pants, to a yellow dress shirt, and an orange suit over it, finishing off the mad ensemble was a dead red tie. Above his shoulders, a square shape, filled with the colours of the rainbow. His head…

...was a TV.

[A̧҉͢h̶͘̕ḩ͟ y͜m̶g̛͏'̸͠ ̶a͜h̶͡ ҉n͘͢ì̵l͞͞g̡ḩ'̸ŗ̶i ̷͘to͟d̵̨ay҉̡!]

‘...Ah, my face.’ The floor was cold, and there was an intense pain, or at least that’s what Sieghart thought, the pain had made the others and myself black out for a moment. Even after it had receded his vision swam as he tried to stand back up, trying to look at him.

[Sorry, sorry, forgot what language humans spoke.]

‘What in the world was that!? He spoke and-and,’ Sieghart couldn’t remember anything after that.

[Now normally I don’t make house calls, but figured I’d make an exception just this once. I̤̘̞͍̻̘̝͌̈́ĝ̷̨͔̪͓̪ͨ̾ͥ̽̚o̡͗ͤ͌̇҉͖r͈̳ͥ͒͒̾̚͝ always did make it seem like this was fun.]

For some reason Sieghart couldn’t move. He could still think, but something about him just enraptured their attention and kept it hostage causing his body to be incredibly lethargic.

[I’ll make things very simple. Don’t die. Oh, and make sure to entertain me. It's not that hard, I’m easily excitable.] His old timey tv head from the 60s switched from the classic RGB screen to a scene of people dying briefly before stopping at an animal documentary.

People opened their mouths, probably to rebel or shout obscenities, until he drew attention to his gun. Sieghart didn’t know why a tv man was carrying around a revolver but he held it with an experienced hand. He’d used it before.

He drew his index finger to the middle of the screen where all the colour on the screen had concentrated on the finger surrounded by black.

[You don’t have a choice, well to be more accurate, you all used to have a choice, and you chose to be here. So let’s disavow with all the hypocrisy] He tilted his head, as all the colour splashed against the side, before leaking out of his head and splashing onto the floor. [Alright?]

Sieghart realized then that no one could move, and it wasn’t because of his gun.

[Wonderful. If you want to remember how you got here, or simply enjoy yourself, whatever you desire, I don’t care. Try to achieve it. I already have what I want anyways.]

What he wanted?

[Besides not dying, I’ll be nice and explain the basics. You’ll be completing missions right there on your old timey watches I asked ol’ Ḱͧ̐̎̂̏ͥ͋̄͆ͭ͂ͬ̽͋̚͏̫̫̤̻̭͙͈̞̮͜͟͝r̨̨͍̝̻͖̰͎͓̙̱̘̒̄̄̿ͪ́̕͠o̷̥͎̭̯̹̳̼̲̖̜̩͇̠͍̯̅͆̿ͬ͗ͤ̈ͮ̎͒͢ņ̛̗͙͇͖̱͇̠͇̗̗̰͉̭͖̙̎ͥͦ̓ͩ̊̂̀͜͡ö̸̧͔̟͔̫͉̜̩̰̝̣͔̟́̄͂̿ͣ͌̉ͨͨ͛ͤ̈́̓̒ͪ̕͜s̨̒ͧ̈̑ͨ̂́̐͒͋ͭ̑̉̌ͦ̋ͦ͟͞҉̖̥̫̠̮͓ͅ to cook up with my own little touches. There are a few other functions it has, but I’ll let you figure out their mysteries. There isn’t much more to this than that. Survive and you might have a chance to go back home.]

Since they couldn’t move, none of them could check about what he was talking about. Missions? Watches?

He put a finger to his head flipping to a scene of an unnaturally massive library [I think that’s everything. Hmm, This wasn’t as fun as I̤̘̞͍̻̘̝͌̈́ĝ̷̨͔̪͓̪ͨ̾ͥ̽̚o̡͗ͤ͌̇҉͖r͈̳ͥ͒͒̾̚͝ made it out to be though.] He seemed to mutter to himself, [Maybe I should’ve focused on a singular cast… Ah, mistakes to fix for next time, ciao!]

Sieghart could move again. Immediately, lunged towards him, trying to tackle the TV man. The Multicoloured fashion statement turned one of the dials on the side of his head and disappeared. The gun he was holding falling to the ground as if its strings cut.

We all took a moment to digest this, Sieghart could tell some people were barely holding themselves from lashing out. At someone or even something.

Question? Missions? None of what they were saying was making any remote sense. Sieghart sighed, and picked up the gun, not sure what to even do with it. It was just a gun from the looks of it nothing special, they were unlikely to be any real clues on it, it was very ordinary. It was naturally empty of any bullets. But didn’t doubt the weird TV didn’t have something else up his sleeve. The two people who were calm throughout were standing to the side a little paler than normal and seeming to recover from the shock.

The others were already shouting and trying to demand someone explain what was happening, other people were in denial and in various stages of self delusion, while a little annoying, he did understand their feelings.

Sieghart walked up to them, “Nice to meet you, my name is Sieg-”

“Jack, and that’s Reaper.” The other man with three scars on his face grimly smiled, but his eyes weren’t in it very distracted. Focusing more on the spot the TV man had disappeared off to.

“Hate to ask, but uh, do you have any idea of what's going on?”

“I do, I’ll explain to everyone.” Sieghart was surprised he did, and even more so he was nicer than he looked. He guessed it really was true, not being able to judge a book by its cover.

Yeah no. There was something very off about them, they reminded me of his dad’s colleagues, people who had seen too much, and done more than what they saw to survive. People you were never sure were really on your side, until crunch time.

Everyone had stopped talking as he spoke, just something made them stop, he was very quiet, unlike the maniac oddness that was the TV man, “If you guys survive until the end you’ll be taken to the Lobby where you can exchange your points for stats, skills, genetic mutations or items, we both have a genetic mutation and this gun you see here. The last setting we were in was the Movie Jaws, and there were twenty of us at the start. "

If they glowed any brighter Sieghart might’ve gone blind from the two rays of happiness, though given what they said it was sort of apt-

Side Mission: Tutorial for New Players – Now Locked

What?

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Player ???: Sieghart Valunheim

???

Main Mission: Survive or Kill the Escaped Experiment

Difficulty: Tier 8-C+

World: Marvel Universe

Time Limit: One Month

Side Missions:

Tutorial for New Players – Now Locked ? ? ...

Points: Pending

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Wait… Was this like an RPG? A sick twisted RPG. Kidnapping people to play this game.

Then where were the basic weapons and skills one got? Or did we get any at all? By the fact, they were holding AKs meant we could get guns but from where? The Lobby they said but where was that? Sieghart felt he might’ve accepted the situation a bit too fast, but attributed it to the fact that nothing had happened yet that was beyond his understanding.

With the possible weird TV man, but that was likely just a costume and misdirection when he had disappeared. Meaning even though he had somehow traveled to another universe, judging by the floating translucent window in front of him. Passing his hand through it had the screen ripple much like water. So at the very least this had a lot of resources poured into it.

He had two theories he was running simultaneously.

This was an actual fantasy death game RPG in Marvel Someone spent way too much time to set all this up, and was likely a very expensive and resource driven project.

‘There were more questions than answers, and the two didn’t exactly exude a friendly enough aura where people felt safe in asking them questions, even if they faked it remarkably well. People didn't bring weapons to picnics...except maybe my dad.’ Deciding it didn’t matter, all he had to do was focus on figuring out where he really was and just keep an open, but cautious, mind.

Sieghart looked behind him noting the large moon illuminating the yard, and started to lean towards theory number one more than two.

Giant words standing in reverse and partially hidden by the large skyscraper in the middle of the yard and crescent shape of the building they were in.

Sieghart still hadn't accepted what was happening or at least parts of what was happening.

Letters about ten meters high, and made out of metal.

Oscorp.

‘What.’

There was just no way.

He almost denied what he was seeing. ‘Maybe this was a dream. Maybe I had been drinking. Maybe, mayb-maybe-’

‘Were they really in another world?’

After a moment he denied it, ‘It's too much for an elaborate prank, an incredible waste of time and money.’

However, if they really were in the Marvel Universe, to be on the safe side it would be best to remember what he could.

Much of what he remembered for Oscorp was pretty bad, at least when Spidey wasn't around. It was a spawning ground for evil and none of it was remotely normal or weak. Most of the time bizarre experiments escaping or someone stole some tech and went on a rampage. That was the mild stuff.

‘No, I’m getting ahead of myself, this is just a bad dream, a really hyper realistic bad dream.’ It was likely a death match by the super corporate elite demon worshippers or something.

Or maybe he had been kidnapped as a trial experiment for beta Virtual Reality testing. For a second, he had been hopeful but knew it was stupid.

Pinching his skin, it was unlikely, no matter how much research people had been doing they wouldn’t be able to get the world in such detail, at least not this early, even with quantum computing.

Perhaps this really was an elaborate tv game show?

But without any memories of coming here?

Sieghart gulped and tried to relax, and take note of what was important.

Game Master, Lobby, Marvel Universe, OSCORP, Points, RPG shop, Side Missions.

And the Mission; Survive The Escaped Science Experiment.

Whether this was real or not, the first or the second theory, he knew everyone was in danger at the very least.

‘You don't survive Escaped Experiment scenarios by choice, you need plot armour for that. There was no way I’m the protagonist.’ he thought, ‘I’m kind of capable, having had military training.’ Feeling better about his survival odds if realistically and not narratively. Marginally.

Sieghart felt around in his pocket and pulled out a pen and pocket notebook and wrote it all down. Because it looked like he was going to be busy worrying about surviving the next few hours to even think about recalling all this in future was unlikely.

When Sieghart looked up the two veterans had left. While expected… it was still disappointing they really didn't have any reason to stay or help. People had started to calm down some.

It was best to speak up, even reluctantly, we needed to work together to survive this pseudo-horror story.

Sieghart wasn’t exactly the tallest so he stood on a chair and spoke up, “Has anyone heard of Oscorp?”

They all looked at me like he was nuts, he returned the look. How had they never heard of-

Looking at their attire, most of them in business suits and dresses with the exception of two who wore normal street clothes but they all looked to be in their 30-40s. The type of people that just worked continuously.

Right, old people.

Sieghart tried to explain in as much detail of what he knew, which wasn’t much.

This turned out to be a good thing as he realized he could improvise and lead them into thinking certain things, and perhaps skip the entire denial of their reality that nothing of this sort could ever happen and break off the group.

Denial was annoying, dealing with it myself wasn’t as hard with the kind of take things in stride attitude Sieghart had gotten from his dad, his love of fiction and again dad's crazy survival scenarios.

They weren’t ever this elaborate though.

“To put it bluntly, too much time, detail and resources have gone into this for any of this to be normal, so I urge you all to keep an open mind. It looks like we've been taken against our will to a random location near the city, judging by the light pollution in the horizon.”

Sieghart played it off like this was the real world which he still half believed was true and especially since we had no idea how we got here, which was true.

“This place looks like a research facility that pioneered in the various fields of science; biology, and chemistry and the like,” true.

Now to the crux, “I’ve heard of ‘reports’ of bio-weaponry and experimentation on humans, this could be something that is happening now. I believe us to have been kidnapped to be forced to play this sick twisted game which is basically a way for them to gather data, or it was for some rich guy's perverse entertainment.” Sieghart cringed slightly as he said it out loud, it sounded a lot more ridiculous than when he was just thinking about it.

Sieghart looked to their faces realizing he might’ve done-goofed. They didn't look like they believed a word he had said about the last bit, the ones who might’ve just seemed more scared, a few were slightly calmer. None of it as intended.