EMPTY CHAIRS AT EMPTY TABLES

[onemind]

CHARACTERS: All
WHERE: Concordia - VEN DIAGRAMS HQ + BOUT IT OUT PARLOR + BEARINGS APARTMENT BLOCK
WHEN: Late Day :022 + Early Day :023
SUMMARY: The results of all your hard work - for better or worse. One win, one draw, one loss. Anakin Skywalker bites the big one.
WARNINGS: Violence, non-graphic character death.

IT’S BEEN A LONG DAY. Unfortunately, that’s not about to change any time soon. In the late hours of the evening, two things are happening: the final round of the Bout It Out expose between Kun-Kun and The Darkling is spooling up; meanwhile, the infiltration team at Ven Diagrams is working to retrieve information on H+H1 from the company’s security drive. Unfortunately, neither is going to reach the natural conclusion.

At the REGAL STREET GAMING PARLOR, emotions are running high. After a long day of simulation violence and the reveal of Kun-Kun’s new automaton fighting avatar, the crowd has been stoked to a few pitch. The music’s loud but the crowd is louder: cheering and booing, shouting for every landed or evaded strike. There’s an electric pulse of excitement in the air-- and then there’s a very literal one as an electromagnetic pulse rocks the Regal Street Parlor. The Bout It Out ring shorts and the entire parlor is pitched into total, window-less darkness. It doesn’t take more than a few seconds for the crowd’s excitement to melt into panic. Pushing, shoving, shouting - a piercing shriek as one of Kun-Kun’s representatives is stabbed. The nearby hosts (Lexa, Sam Alexander, and anyone in their faux attachment) should be able to help Kun-Kun and his reps to safety, but the crush of the crowd tangles up everyone else. When a rudimentary bomb goes off in the center of the parlor, it catches plenty of people in the crossfire.

There’s a white hot flash. A pulse of heat. A sizzle of agony. It’s a pain that guts, that persists long after the flash of the bomb and extends all the way to the infiltration team at Ven Diagrams. It’s like a limb badly severed. Anakin Skywalker is killed by the blast and every host knows it before they’re aware of anything else.

Unluckily for the infiltration team, they won’t have much time to recover. News of the bombing hits Extraspace in a matter of seconds, which triggers Ven Diagrams - paranoid from the recent attack on their own properties - to lock down their headquarters. All systems are tightened and security clamps down before the infiltration team can access the private servers. If you’re somewhere you’re not supposed to be, now’s the time to get the hell out of dodge.

Retreat, regroup. Upon returning to the Bearings apartment block, the hosts will find that two of their previously comatose friends have woken up: Hux and Aoba Seragaki will probably need to be briefed on the current situation.

     I. THE ROOM WHERE IT HAPPENS
In the Regal Street Gaming Parlor, a pulse flashes. Electronics sizzle. A fight reaching rhythm is shattered and darkness consumes the parlor in its entirety. There’s something like a collective inhale - and then the panic sets in. Screaming. Pushing. Elbows in the dark and a wave of bodies forcing their way toward wherever they think the exit is. Parlors like this one are supposed to be shielded from this kind of problem, but today that doesn’t matter. In just a few short moments of panic, a bomb - basic compared to the one that blew out the Ven Diagram warehouse only days ago - goes off.

There’s a buzz. An electrical hiss. In the wake of the explosion - in the wake of the agony of Anakin’s death -, the parlor’s fire systems go off flooding the upper and lower levels, the spectator balconies with flame retardant powder and coolant. The emergency lighting kicks on, throwing the carnage into stark fluorescent light. The probable intended victim has escaped, along with his entourage, but there are plenty of wounded - groans and weeping permeate the chemical stale air. In addition to Anakin, three people have been killed and two androids have been rendered into scrap by the explosion. Countless others could use help; maybe even a few other hosts have been wounded by the blast.

     II. MEANWHILE...
If you’re part of the infiltration team, you’ve officially overstayed your welcome. Security tightens to a chokehold; if you’re somewhere you shouldn’t be, it’s time to leave. An alarm blares through the development laboratories. The building is evacuated and then sealed throughout. The powerlifts cease operation. All networked systems go offline.

     III. FROM THE JAWS OF DEFEAT
Back at the parlor, the evacuation continues. The parlor is half-collapsed, there are injured to tend to and local authorities to deal with. In a matter of minutes, the the parlor is swarmed by public security and medical personnel. If you’re able bodied, you’re welcome to assist with rescue efforts - or try to find a lead on who could’ve been responsible for this. Some evidence, some sign - anything to make this worth it. During this time those with Kun Adetokunbo will have the chance to make their case.

It’s a long, protracted clean up and triage; it’s absolutely possible that some of the infiltration team members might make it to the site of the explosion to assist or care for their friends. 

     IV. WE TEND OUR WOUNDED, WE COUNT OUR DEAD
In the early hours of the morning on Day 023, the hosts limp back to Bearings. Maybe it should be achingly quiet, but it’s not - there’s a murmur of activity in the mental air as Hux and Aoba muddle out of their way from out of their comas. From here, it’s up to to the hosts to recover, to discuss how they want to proceed, and come up with a way to recover from this setback - and from Anakin’s death.

---

((OOC NOTES: Here it is, your wrapup log for the event! You may have noticed that the Hosts didn’t succeed at the Ven Diagrams infiltration. We thought this was a better way than asking everyone to handwave a huge amount of plot or simply having the NPCs get the evidence. Don’t worry though - there will be other mysteries to unravel soon. Very soon, in fact.

There will be an NPC top-level for the escape with Kun-Kun, but otherwise you’re free to make your own top levels! If you have any questions please feel free to ask them in the event OOC post.

Thanks everyone!))

NAVIGATION • SETTING • FAQ • MOD CONTACT • GLOSSARY

( CODE BY WHAMBAM )

Comments

[decommission]

[ The man in the uniform. If the attack that brought Steve to the Station had happened only a day later, he would've had the face from those flyers. It's hard not to imagine that having those features might ease the confusion for Bucky, keep his mind from jumping between past and present

He shouldn't focus on what he can't change. Only what he can do now. ]

Steve. [ He supplies his own name, voice softening. ] This happened before, the last time you were in a fight. [ Holes in his memory, missing time. ] It'll come back.

[ I promise. ]

[bracchium]

Steve.

[The Soldier parrots, voice distant. He stares off into the middle ground for a moment longer before he asks,] I was in a fight?

[He tries stepping back from the jumble that is his memories and tack on pieces to the scaffolding Steve supplies. A fight. What does he remember of a fight? Shouting. Punching. Cracking. You're my mission and a metal fist hitting a thicker version if Steve's face again and again. He blinks and takes in the dark purples and blues smudged across Steve's face.]

I hit you.

[But that doesn't make any sense. Steve is too calm for someone sitting in a small bedroom with his assailant. Then again, what had been that touch on his mind. Was that Steve? Or was it the mission, the humming chair that he fears.]

[decommission]

[ His eyebrows knit together again. ] No, you didn't.

[ He's sure enough for both of them. Steve shifts his weight, frowning. ] I was at a game parlour, watching a tournament fight. [ Their mission. There's a hollow quality to his voice as he continues. ] A bomb went off in the building, people got hurt and killed. I got into a fight with... someone looking to do more damage. [ Ren. He doesn't know how to explain Ren - wouldn't know even if Bucky had all his memories. He hates feeling as though he's apologizing for or protecting the guy. Tells himself that's not what this is.

Another pause, and he keeps going: ] You were across town when it happened. [ Anakin's death, the fighting. Nothing humorous about that, but there's a tired, wry twist of his mouth when he talks about the fight again. ] I was doing alright on my own [ he wasn't ] but you showed up and clocked him good. Then more people came to try to break it up, I guess.

[ And then they ended up here. He ends that part of the explanation weakly, in a I don't really know either sort of way. The details are fuzzy. ] You must've been able to feel when the explosion went off. [ He eyes Bucky. ] We've got that... mind connection. Like this -

[ He lifts his hand to his face, pressing a finger against his broken cheek. Steve gives a wince and the tether between them gives a weak pulse, like pressure against a limb that's fallen asleep. No pain transfers, nothing more than faint pins and needles. ]

[bracchium]

[You're my mission echoes in his head, combining almost perfectly witht the purples and blues mottling Steve's face, but the certainty in the wounded man's head weighs The Soldier's--- Bucky's--- shards of memory down. They collapse under the consequent doubt and a surge of frustration bubbles from the wreckage. He listens to Steve's version of the events, brain humming. When Steve touches his cheek, pins and needles burst through his face.

Mission report, now! A familiar face and a familiar hand underground. He doesn't get to keep this one thing.

The Soldier does his part. He obeys orders. He's not allowed to want things. He's not allowed a name.

He sits down slowly, feet and arms open, palms up.]

Did the mission succeed? [He knows that much about himself, about being The Soldier.]

[decommission]

[ No good. His hand lowers again, slowly. ]

I don't know. [ Part of him asks what does it matter now? People died, people who didn't have any mission - and Anakin. His equilibrium takes another blow from that thought, two places in his mind now empty where something once belonged.

(can't he remember how it was before they were there to begin with?)

His gaze is still fixed on Bucky's face. ] Anything ringing a bell?

[ Did it take this long for him to remember last time? Is the issue with his memory getting worse? ]

[bracchium]

[The Soldier considers the question posed to him. Pieces sound familiar, the raw sensation of loss most of all, but some of the shards he's collected are seemingly untrue. He regards Steve with furrowed brows and a genuine desire to remember, but he feels clumsy, too much so. And he hates it.]

I don't know. [There's so much missing and burned away. It's hard to know not only what's missing but how much, too.]

[decommission]

[ His mind closes off now, fully, to hold back the weight of his concern. The same can't be said for his face though, his eyebrows knitted together and parted lips missing words for a moment. ]

There's someone else here, his name's Sam. Sam Wilson. Talking to him might help. [ Sam got Bucky to come back here. Maybe that brood connection can fill in the blanks that Steve can't. ]

[bracchium]

[Sam Wilson. That rings a stronger bell, plucks at the strings in his head and sets them vibrating. One of the other minds deeply connected to his own. Broodmate. Comrade. Can you scoot your chair up? Watching Steve from the back seat of a very cramped car. Steve and Sam crouched in a similarly fitting hole in the wall.

Bucky blinks over at Steve with a growing familiarity. Steve was smaller, Steve---] You didn't go to war?

[decommission]

[ The question's like an old bruise getting bumped. A quick shake of his head, gaze flicking away to settle on the floor for a moment before returning to meet Bucky's again. ]

Missed my last chance, ended up here instead. [ A pause. ] It was 1943 when I left home, but you and Sam showed up from seventy years later.

and 600 years later...

[bracchium]

[Some of the feedback brushes the edges of Bucky's mind, familiar like an arm slung over narrow shoulders, pulling him in close. Don't do anything stupid. Sargeant James Barnes--- was the only Commando to give his life serving his country. 1943. Seventy years later.

Waking up to glass frosted over. Dragged on his knees to The Chair. It sounds like a broken fan and still sucks everything he is out in one gulp. The words. The goddamn words and he's in a room of steel, head buzzing and throwing Sam Wilson like he's a toy.

But Sam is his broodmate. Why would he---?

Sorry Steve, you're getting a ringside seat to the shitshow.]

[decommission]

[ The hair at the back of his neck stands up, a deep cold settling into his bones. ]

Wasn't you, Buck. [ His voice softens again. ] Whenever you remember fighting me or Sam - that wasn't you. That was HYDRA.

[bracchium]

[Steve's words are so familar, they buzz and echo in his head. Each wave draws more and more memories back into his mind, patching the raw burns in bits and pieces. In the back of the Quinnjet, Steve's words ring hollow in the face of another incident, after Clint and Scott lay down their freedom in exchange for Bucky.]

Yeah, but I did it. [His response is heavy, but far less distant. He's coming back.] I remember every one of them.

[Not just Sam. His fist slams into Howard Stark's face until bones crack and splinter, no witnesses.]

[decommission]

[ Have they had this conversation before? Mental shields perforated from the fight allow flickers of memory, his own fist curling against the side, tension persisting through the relief he feels when Bucky's tone begins to shift. That Steve doesn't recognize the face doesn't soften the brutality of the scene. ]

I know. [ Doesn't change who you are, not to me - is what he wants to mean. ]

[bracchium]

[They... they have. Steve's clenched fist glows beside his as he plows into Kylo Ren. The Parlor. Then Sam did... something. Something that blew the bejeezus out of his head. That's what happened. The raging jet engine that was Sam Anders scattered Bucky's head to the winds.

But he's sitting here on the floor in front of Steve--- Steve--- with a pounding headache as he finds himself face-to-face with the reality of a blown-up brain, again.]

Yeah, I know, too. [Is the somber verbal answer to Steve's unvoiced sentiment shared across the bond, his tone warming further.

He's Bucky. He's Bucky and he's part of a hivemind with Steve and a handful of Sams. Steve's small, before whatever made him big. Steve can't take hits as well anymore and the bruises on his face are evidence.]