The Lost Island of Dr. Moreau

[Guest]

"These creatures you have seen are animals carven and wrought into new shapes. To that, to the study of the plasticity of living forms, my life has been devoted. I have studied for years, gaining in knowledge as I go. I see you look horrified, and yet I am telling you nothing new. It all lay in the surface of practical anatomy years ago, but no one had the temerity to touch it."
--The Island of Dr. Moreau, by H.G. Wells

Welcome to the Lost Island of Dr. Moreau. All are welcomed to join and the more people we get the more fun this will be. If you have seen the films or read the story then all the better, but it is not required to understand the premise. I'd like to get at least 4-5 people before we start the actual gameplay. Discussion of the storyline and suggestions for it are welcome; nothing is set in stone.

Basic Plot: It has been several years since the original doctor was on the island and performed his genetic vivisection research on animals, and another doctor, James Cole, having found old notes and manuscripts kept by the original man has followed in his footsteps and made a new island to conduct his own research on. With the same pursuit of knowledge as the old doctor, Cole puts human and animal alike under his surgical knife, blending the lines between beast and human and creating something altogether new. It's been a few years since he's started his own experimentation. The beast folk have a village in the northern half of the island while the doctor creates more of them in his lab and compound in the center of the island. There are laws set up to keep the beast folk from giving in to their primal urges, most important of them being "Not to eat of the flesh or spill blood." But some of them have started to break the Laws in secret and with new people arriving to the island to become experiments, rebellion brews in the air and a zoological nightmare waits to come into fruition.

Introduction Post:

The verdant green of the jungle breathed with the wind, like a swollen lung encroaching upon the beach on all sides of the island. Nothing could be heard except the sigh of the wind and the waves crashing upon the shore, occasional wildlife screeching distantly and a passing gull cawing sorrowfully. Deeper into the muggy shadows of tropical trees, the shade playing tricks with the eye and hidden things darting past too close for comfort, it felt like being in the belly of a great vegetation beast. Smoke rises in several plumes to the south, like black fingers holding up the sky and the faint smell of food cooking drifts on the wind. Other survivors, maybe? Or inhabitants of this lost place on the edge of the world? Friends or foes?

In that direction lies the village of the inhabitants of this place. Well established small huts in a large open space centralized around a large cookfire sitting in the middle of the square. Something organic is cooking over the flames and a few other fires within the huts can be seen by the tendrils of blackened clouds wafting from the tips of their rooftops. And wandering around the village in this primitive looking place, are horrible beasts walking on two legs. Monstrosities of nature dressed in rags of clothing, as if trying to retain some semblance of humanity, grumbling in guttural voices to one another in a parody of language that is all but bestial in nature.

Hidden in the middle of the island there is a compound, hard to reach for the maze of trees and rising mountains that separates it from the beach on both sides. From the outside it looks like a humble, comfortable abode with two floors and a tiered veranda all around the outside. From inside can be heard the sound of a lilting piano playing, a melancholy sound drifting through the jungle surrounding the building, with musical notes spilling forth from a skilled and passionate hand. After a few moments, a bestial screaming starts, low at first and then growing in volume, like a woman yowling in pain with the growl of a jaguar spliced into her voice. The piano stops abruptly as the screams continue on in the absence of music and after several moments, the screaming is choked off just as abruptly. Silence fills the air, except for a few wild birds cawing plaintively in the brush and after several minutes, the piano starts up again, unperturbed by the interruption.

Further exploration of the jungle leads you along to find a stream running through it in a south-southwestern crawl and in one of the trees is the split open corpse of a small furry creature, it's fur stained red upon the tree in which it lays and dripping upon the ground beneath it. It is in stark contrast to the vegetable based meal that had been cooking on the fire in the village of the beasts and you wonder what has killed this innocent thing and eaten of it's flesh? Something that might like the taste of you, probably.

**********************

As far as characters go, you can be either a person coming to the island, or a person/being who is already there. Things we need--human test subjects and a few rebellious beast folk who will later try and take over. People coming to the island will most likely be shipwrecked from the same cruise ship and are the lone survivors. I will be playing Dr. James Cole and possibly the leader of the beast folk village, The Sayer of the Law.

Character sheets
Name:
Age:
Gender:
Appearance: (can use a photo and/or actual description)
Bio:
Animal: (for people coming to the island what they will be transformed into and what the beast folk were transformed into; all beast folk are hybrids of humans)
Luggage: (for those coming to the island, things they brought with them; may be useful in a jam)


*All new players must submit a character sheet before play.
**rule on luggage= don't go overboard on us and bring like an ak47 to take out the islanders. No more than two suitcases worth of stuff, at most one weapon.

Map of the Island

The lines that look like cracks are suppose to be mountains.

[Bird of Hermes]

I would be willing to play a human test subject.

[Guest]

Awesome! =D I'm very glad someone decided to join me.

[Byron Huxeley]

could I possibly play a human scientist who is interested in what you are doing? A gentleman that wishes the company of another gantleman to discuss more unorthodoth practices?

[Guest]

Yes, most certainly Byron! That will be splendid!

[Guest]

Alright, Byron disappeared, so I'm wondering if there is anyone else interested in playing this with me and Hermes(if she's still willing as well).

[YenWen]

I'm sorry I didn't notice this before. I love splicing roleplays, so I'm all in. I'd prefer a rebellious beast, if you don't mind. When Harper gets back on Sunday, I'm sure he'd be interested as well. Are there limits on creatures? Since it's a jungle terrain, some animals wouldn't be fit for it, such as arctic creatures, and many types of bears.

[Guest]

Hello! =D I'm glad you posted! I had just about given up on this idea getting off the ground!

I hadn't really thought of a limit on animals, but realistically, that would make sense. There isn't a limit on size because Dr. Cole will be manipulating genes as well as surgically altering forms, so something like a rodent-person would be possible. How about this limit: You can use any animals that live within the bounds of the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn, since Cole's island exists somewhere in the South Pacific. Domestic animals, even though they do not originate from these places should be alright as well. Sound good? =)

Boundary map

[YenWen]

Sounds absolutely perfect. So basically it's more the animal DNA is manipulated to fit the human form, as if it attaches? I'm sorry, I made a roleplay similar to this before, and I get very much into the actual science of it. Should also be a limit to the abilities the creatures gain? I mean, they may be gaining some animal abilities, but shouldn't they also have the human limits, in varied ways? Such as someone who's gained the DNA of a bat can use the Sonar, but may not be able to fly as well as a bat can, and their eyesight is now damaged.

[Guest]

Hm, another good set of questions and points. Basically, the original doctor, if you've read the short story, used vivisection on animals, to mold and carve their bodies and make them as human as he possibly could. In the movie made in 1996, they went with a more modern approach and said he also introduced genetic engineering in combination with the surgical procedure of altering animals to make them human.

With this new doctor, I'm going a few steps further and he's also using genetic engineering to alter humans, to try and span the line between what is animal and what is human, trying to come up with a perfect transformation between both, for the sake of pursing knowledge. If that makes any sense.

And as far as limitations on power, I thought I'd take it as a case-by-case thing; If someone submitted a creature that was overly powerful, they'd be asked to alter it, but I generally trusted that people wouldn't go overboard here.

[YenWen]

So now they can come from either end point, meaning the ones coming from the animal end point would generally be less human, most likely in behavior, than the ones developed first from humans. I feel like I'm overly asking questions, but it's to have a better idea on character development.

Now, a terrain question, as I did realize there were mountains that completely cut off parts of the island. Considering these creatures are still partially human, they'd most likely develop a real society, yes? With a leader, a set of laws, and with the laws, punishments. Could some have been entirely forced out to banishment in such areas, or is the village entirely fenced off?

[Guest]

Nonsense. You're fine and questions are good. Helps flesh out details I didn't think to mention. =) And yes, that's the basic idea with the transformations. As an added bonus, humans that are altered will have their memories intact, and as a result will most likely rebel against what happened to them.

A society, yes. Cole has set them up in a beast village about 7 miles from his laboratory compound, and he visits them occasionally to check up on how they're surviving and to give them injections to halt the regression process. He also set them up with a bunch of rules to help them act more human and a "Sayer of the Law" who is the leader of their village. I will include in the OOC the list of Laws as well as adding this other information we've talked about.

Laws
Not to go on all fours
Not to suck up drink
Not to claw the bark off of trees
Not to chase other men
Not to eat fish or flesh
Not to spill blood
Not to make love to more than one


There are also no gates around their community, so the beast folk can come and go in the jungle as they please. Most of the laws are designed to help them mimic human behavior and they are made to repeat the list in a chant to help them remember to fight their urges and instincts. Some are more serious than others and generally small infractions are ignored by Dr. Cole. The last three are serious offenses and result in punishment. If a beast person murders another being(that includes the eating of meat), they themselves are terminated but only if Cole is notified of the crime. There is enough jungle and places on the island for things like that to be hidden.

I hope I have answered your questions sufficiently. =)

[YenWen]

So, does that mean Dr. Cole has a preference for a certain type of creature? Seeing as carnivores normally need meat to function properly, they'd be the first to violate the law, unless he's trying to perfect such carnivorous creatures to not need to spill blood. But, that does make for an interesting situation, to have a vegetarian human merged with, say, a dingo.

[Guest]

I figured, he included/kept enough human genes in them to make them all omnivores and delete the necessity of eating meat. However, yes, with carnivorous animals, you will have a struggle against the basic instinct to hunt and kill as they naturally would.

[YenWen]

But, does that mean he has a preference, though? Does he purposely use carnivorous animals to try and make them stop killing, or does he use more herbivores to limit killing of any kind?

[Guest]

The way I reasoned out the whole meat thing and punishment was that any of them who do eat meat are more likely to attack and eat their fellows who would be natural prey. So, I guess he uses carnivores to see if he can alter their desire to kill. Instinct is something to be conquered and subdued, in his eyes.

[YenWen]

Alright, finally, do you want the profiles posted here, in an OOC, or pmed to you? :3

[Guest]

I'm working on the OOC right now and you can post profiles there once I have it set up. =)

[YenWen]

Perfect. I'll get working on it :3

[Guest]

The OOC is set up. =)

[Sponsored content]