AWKWARD ZOMBIE

Brandon goes over to help what he is guessing is The Yellow One.

Did... Did the dimension collapse?

I dunno. Where are you bastards!?

I'm still waiting for the Shaman to explain further

I'm waiting for The Yellow One to do something.

-- Well, in those cases... --

The equine poked around the wrecked office, up-righting and overturned desk, plugging lamps back in, gathering bullets back into their boxes, all while constantly muttering about keeping the door locked and stupid rabbits made of shadows that know nothing about keeping off of private prop-

The equine looked up at the group, realizing she'd been expositioning out loud.

-----

The Shaman threw the herbs into the flame, causing it to enlarge and grow paler until it was transparent, but instead of seeing the other side of the tent, Alec saw a young, anthro squirrel facing away from them, hurriedly snatching several crystal orbs that were floating around him and peering inside them before sending them back to their floating with a toss over his shoulder. A sheathe long enough for a generic-ish long sword hung at his waist.

With a quick glance over his shoulder, the squirrel quickly returned to his business, "I told you already, Marx. Third shelf on the very left." The Shaman, Marx apparently, chuckled, "No, my friend. We've met someone you might like to see." Quickly, the squirrel turned on his heels, his face lighting up as he tossed every orb in his arms aside, "So you have. You must be... No wait, don't tell me. You're that guy from the clergy, a nice guy if I remember. Pretty crappy job though, especially when any sort of plague is involved... I would hold your shock and confusion if you have any, sudden inhalation of the herbs in that tent and you'll be out for a few hours." He said to keep Alec from gasping. "I know it's shocking some random guy knows most of your past, but you'll get used to it around here, uh..." He paused, still trying to remember Alec's name.

"Sh...Shadow Rabbits?"

Alec was most confused indeed. He was not accustomed to strangers knowing a great deal about him. He rarely ever talked about himself, and behind his mask he was just another faceless doctor. "How do you know these things?" Alec asked.

The equine rubbed her head, "I know, I know. It sounds far-fetched coming from a bright yellow talking horse this rabble about rabbits made of shadows but... Hey! That mangy mutt didn't find my orb!" The equine shouted picking up a bright crystal orb and a golden pedestal, placing them both on the desk as they hummed to life, projecting the image of an anthro squirrel talking to somebody else off-screen.

-----

The squirrel chuckled, "I would explain to you, but that would take a large amount of time, time we do not presently have," he said, taking a couple of orbs and checking them again, "Especially sense your arrival has been confirmed, which means the plans of both sides of this mess are going along swimmingly, which means we have even less time than I mentioned earlier." He quickly looked over his shoulder, back to Alec, "This isn't exactly hope-inspiring, so I'll just cut straight to the good part."

The squirrel cleared his throat and several orbs floated around him, "As you might have noticed, you aren't in the world you're used to, trust me, nobody is around here. You're in the Zeroth Dimension, formally an empty pit, now it's a pit that likes to eat things. Because of that, this place has turned into a giant mish-mash of many inhabitable places one can hope to never enter. Luckily the persistence and will to live from many races, such as your generous hosts over there, have made some places just a little better. Other places... Well, it's hard to civilize a pit of sand full of anything that'll try to eat you if you stand still long enough."

"Naturally, having too many mini-planets in one place is an absolute booty to keep track of, so I had to put a stop to that. So I made a dimensional barrier to keep anything going in and out except for myself and my companions, and everything was stable in the Zeroth. Until the barrier fell apart in front of my own eyes, and this place started eating again, that's why you're here now with several other poor souls, but we need you poor souls to fix everything. You see, this dimension leave a slight trace on things it eats, the bigger the thing, the bigger the trace. You've probably got a few specks on you right now. The villagers on the other hand, are spotless. The reason being because that trace was what I used to make the barrier in the place. I used the trace from the many inhabitants of this dimension to make the barrier and keep things in relative order, then, like I said, that barrier broke, so I need more traces, which is where you come in."

"Now, I can't possibly make a strong enough barrier off a bit a trace from a few travelers, so I need something bigger, I need the traces of the mini-planets. All of them." The squirrel took a minute to catch his breath before turning to face the equine and her group's orb, "And how long are you going to take to say something, Scribbles?"

Marcus got up from the ground, he noticed Geo standing inside the broken building. looking at the strange image the orb created.
Geo was listening in on the squirrel mans conversation with the off screen person. "So this place is called Zeroth."
Marcus approached Geo. "What? Zeroth, sounds pretty weird."

"Zeroth." Brandon whispers to the man in the trench, "Why is everyone an animal?"

The squirrel looked himself over, "Well, it gets cold up here. Do you have any idea how warm and cozy I am right now?"

"That's beside the point, anyway. Hopefully, I don't have to repeat myself to you lot, so I'll get straight to the cold crunchy center, the one you're going to be looking for. At least, that's what I'm hoping it is, because to be honest, I have no idea what a large concentration of Trace will look like, my cheddar is on large, white, important, spherical, important, shiny, and more importantly, important." He carried on, "It'll be somewhere around the center of the mini-island. Scribbles, take these guys and check the gravity charm Alex and I set in place, there should at least be a clue there. Then send 'em my way and look for Jack, I haven't heard from for a while." The equine nodded and started to check the boxes of bullets, the squirrel turned back to face Alec. "Meanwhile, good Doctor. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to find the chunk of Trace sitting in the center of the corrupted forest you're sitting in."

Zephiur's arm explodes and he dies.

Sorry, I just haven't been keeping up and probably won't be assed to in the future

Brandon gets splashed with blood and freaks out because his whispers have the power to blow peoples limbs off.

(Not really, I just wanted to say that.)

"So we need to check a gravity charm and find a man named Jack? What's a gravity charm and who's Jack? I would love some answers before I do some thing for you guys. What are your motives for whatever your doing? What's the end result of our actions?"

"I'm not really a hero.." Alec started. This was more of his sister's territory, she was good at quests and danger. But then again, this would be a way to help this world. His time as a doctor didn't seem to do any good in the long run, what else would he do? Stand around until he eventually died of starvation?
After much deliberation Alec finally decided he'd help. It's something that he could do to thank these orcs for being so hospitable, even if they would be heretics in his world. "Where do I need to go?"