[hatch log] pull plug, enter multiverse

[onemind]

CHARACTERS: All
WHERE: The Station + Concordia
WHEN: DAY :025 - :026
SUMMARY: Somewhere deep in Station 72, a hatch happens; new hosts arrive on Concordia.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary.

YOU WAKE UP and in a very real sense you are born again. You’re not the same person you were the last time your eyes were open. You’ll never be that person again - well, except for you, Jessica Jones. You know how this part goes, don’t you?

You might not know it right away, though. What you do know is that you’re laying down in a place very different than you were before. The walls angle around you, claustrophobic, and they emit a gentle white light that’s faint enough not to hurt your freshly opened eyes. For a moment you feel fine even if you didn’t before you went under. Whatever injuries you might have had, whatever agony you may have been experiencing, whatever fear dogged your heels, they’re all gone. It’s quiet. When you’re conscious enough to take stock of anything beyond that, you realize that you’re wearing your own clothes and that there’s a faint pinch at the base of your skull - notable as the only discomfort you feel. Reach up, feel along the tube running from the base of your neck to the compartment’s back wall. It pulls free without much fuss.

Then it’s not so quiet anymore. There’s the sensation of something more, something louder, something both big and broad and something intimately near to you. There’s the realization that you aren’t alone, that you won’t ever be alone again. You belong here. This is as correct as the murmur of something like muffled voices in the back of your head is somehow familiar, or how the press of emotion that sweeps over you now doesn’t necessarily belong to you but doesn’t feel out of place either.

You can sit up - barely -, and shift out of the pod. There’s a ladder at your feet, and a little cubby just before it with anything you brought with you, as well as a set of crisp, loose-fitting white clothes; while your injuries are healed, whatever you’re wearing is in the exact state it was before. You can hear a sound in the back of your head, a faint buzzing, something like distant waves or the murmur of a party behind a door. Drop down the ladder to the floor of the Nesting Deck and you’ll find you’re not alone - and the those sounds in your head are louder. Other people’s thoughts swim up: some of them seem clear, most of them are a jumbled mess. Some of these people call to you - their voices are louder, their feelings more clear, they feel right. Further, there’s an awareness that there are others like you - not here, not close, but somewhere: an indelible tug at the back of your mind.

Welcome to Station 72. All new hosts will have one day aboard the Station before being whisked off to Concordia to join the others. Get to know the other new hosts, and ask the guardians of the Station - Prince and Cathaway -, any burning questions you might have. By the time the day has passed, Carata will arrive on the hangar to collect you.



MEANWHILE IN CONCORDIA Angel slips into a coma on :025 at almost at the exact same time that some Hosts become aware of missing pieces fitting into place. Those hosts with new brood members waking up on the station will feel somewhere more complete; you might want to let everyone know you’ll be getting new roommates soon.

Everyone might be putting themselves and their broods back together in the wake of the explosion that left the nest down one host and injected everyone with renewed motivation to either find the people responsible or make sure nothing like what happened at Royal Street ever happens again. Things are progressing on multiple fronts, but on DAY 26 there’s an option to put some of those efforts on the back burner...

     ON THE STATION, the new hosts are herded onto a sleek, black brick-shaped transport. Carata, a woman young enough to almost be called a girl, carefully makes sure everyone is seated and strapped in. She’s all gentle, easy smiles and cheerful responses to any questions posed to her. When everyone’s safely aboard, the ship’s landing platform descends through the floor of the hangar. It snaps into place in the airlock and for a moment there’s a beat of perfect stillness, a shiver of anticipation. Then the transport is flung through the shaft, ejected into the wild black of space. There’s a nauseating lurch in your belly as it bursts through the delicate shell of the multiverse and snaps into real space above the blue and yellow marble of the planet Opia. Somewhere, thousands of miles below in the city of Concordia, your brood is waiting for you.

     IN CONCORDIA
IN CONCORDIA, as dark falls, Nirad announces he’s going to fetch Carata and the new hosts from their landing. Anyone’s welcome to accompany him on the hour long drive to the stealth transport’s landing zone. The rented bus - manned by that same (now very stoic) android - takes everyone to the outskirts of the industrial block. They arrive at a different parking garage just as the stealth transport drops out of the sky, shivering into sight as it touches down. The hosts on the ship step down and then the stealth transport lifts back off the rooftop and wrinkles out of sight. It’s unclear how many more time they’ll be able to get away with this.

Get your meet and greets in and stretch your legs; you have a few minutes before everyone piles into the van and takes the long drive back to the Bearings Apartment block where the hosts have rented out the entirely of Level 13. New hosts will find there are rooms there that as of yet unclaimed, and they’re free to begin making this their home in whatever ways they please. Get familiar with your new comrades, explore the city, or maybe just take a well deserved breather. Officially speaking, nothing much happens until--

     EARLY ON DAY 27

A NEW WINDOW POPS UP IN YOUR EXTRANET PANEL...

---

((OOC Notes: This is the hatch log for all new and recently returning hosts; any threads on the Station should be closed to newly awakened hosts or Station-based NPCs; a top level for Cathaway and Prince will be going live shortly. Any threads on Concordia can be open to both new and old hosts! For anything happening beyond these calendar dates, feel free to create your own logs and posts.

If you have questions about the mission specifically, direct them to the most recent calendar post HERE. You can find a more detailed overview of the hatching process HERE; you might also want to take a glance at the MISSION CONCORDIA BRIEFING. For all other questions, please hit up either the FAQ or MOD CONTACT pages.))

NAVIGATION • SETTING • FAQ • MOD CONTACT • GLOSSARY

( CODE BY WHAMBAM )

Comments

[sensitively]

[ The aftermath of her fight with Ren has left her senses muddled. The injury to her spine was severe, and even with the newly-infused symbiote in her system a trip to the infirmary is necessitated. But she's already sitting up in her cot, her recovery unimpeded despite the hate and sorrow and shame still radiating from her in waves.

Her humiliation and failure threaten to nearly overwhelm her. She's lost everything, everyone, and he's taken it all from her — even her weapon.

In her emotional state and haze of pain she hasn't even realized what she's expressed to the Darkling with her thoughts. But when her heaving breaths begin to calm and the moisture at the corners of her eyes recedes she is made aware of forgiveness, of the patience that comes with a life spanning longer than she's known, and...of something else.

His praise — alongside his gentle ministrations as he dabs at the blood at the corner of her lips — almost has her leaning into him with tears welling in her eyes anew, having been denied such a simple touch for so long, starved of affection. Rey catches herself just in time, ruthlessly quelling the tears while holding tenaciously onto her pride.

Ren has been here for far longer. When he speaks, this man whom she instinctively understands will come to know her as well as she knows herself, she hears the concern for both in his emotive inflection. ]

But you didn't intrude. [ She blinks; frowns. ] Although you wanted to. Why?

[unsea]

[ He felt it. When her back was struck by his blade. Burning pain, pressed down to the dull ache he felt echoed upon his person by her, being mended by the symbiote at a speed swifter than natural healing, and not quite as quickly as he had seen a Corporalki Healer manage. Even as she speaks and moves, he can feel the twist and the tug of her still-mending injury as though it were on his back, and not simply a ghost-pain wrought of their connection.

She has a core made of steel, his new broodmate. Too much pride to allow herself to lean into him, and enough knowledge of his person, for no other reason than their unique level of closeness, to know he and Ren have a history as well. She'll see them, at the tournament, as battle-partners, in time. The footage is everywhere in the city, there is no hiding that. It would be as good as a lie, and lies festered. Brutal honesty was frightening, but lies - oh, lies would poison them all, in time.

He's too old for lies. ]

I didn't want you to resent me, for stopping you from doing something you wanted. [ The truth. Also, the truth: ] I didn't want him to resent me, either.

[sensitively]

[ He's too old for lies, perhaps, and she's too young and idealistic to want to be fed anything but the harsh, naked truth.

So he's bound to Ren, this man who is part of her brood, who she will share thoughts and memories with in time. It in turn both infuriates her — ( how can you not see what he is? ) — and chastens her, but she tamps down on voicing such thoughts even if she can't rein them in through her shared mindspace, just yet.

Stubbornly she sets her jaw. She averts her gaze from his, quelling tears once more and pursing her lips to prevent them from trembling. She has no leverage here, yet, she's beginning to understand; she cannot demand anything from these people, either her brood or the Nest at large. ]

It wasn't what I wanted; it's what has to be done. [ ...Not exactly. Vengeance isn't a tenet of the Jedi, she's quite sure — but there is no one to instruct her otherwise, here. She sniffs, adjusting her back, and she winces as a frisson of pain lances up her spine. The scar on her back will be grotesque and puckered, not unlike the one Ren bears still on his face and neck. ]

I understand that I can't take his life, in this place, for the same reason he spared mine. [ Her eyes are far away as she recollects with clarity how he plucked Skywalker's saber out of her hand, as she lay broken and helpless on the floor of the corridor. ] But he has something I need.

[ Something she lays claim to; that came to her. That chose her. ]

[unsea]

Easy, [ he reminds her, as she moves and pain blossoms - a dull echo of her own - in his own back.

At this proximity, it's nearly impossible for him to avoid feeling her within himself. She is alive and vibrant, and her pain makes her even more so. And though she is at odds, and knows him now for the division of his self ( kept between Ren and Rey, with no intention of choosing one over the other ), he reaches out to gather her hand into his own. A companionable gesture. Solidarity, here in this place where she hurts. They are bound to one another, and that won't change, not in this lifetime. ]

I know. It's that curious blade, isn't it? The one like the lights of this city.

[ Either he is bold, or lacks shame, in the face of her anger - he sees Ren, for who he is and what he does. He sees Rey, in the same light. They are individuals to be understood, not scolded or forced, who know their own minds and will seek their own ways. So, either he is bold, or he lacks shame, or some combination of both - as he reaches for her face, and brushes away the tears welling in her eyes. ]

I don't plan on stopping you. I can't vouch for the others within this unit.

[sensitively]

[ He cautions her so easily, almost as though he can feel the agony that follows each movement she makes, no matter how insignificant. It piques her curiosity, as does his easy acceptance of her dogged determination to reacquire what's hers; a weapon that he's likely more familiar with than she realizes, given Kylo Ren's, but perhaps has not seen the near-lethal effects of up-close until now. ]

I have nothing left, but that, [ she answers uncertainly, and means to make mention of that and the way his features had twisted ever so slightly when she'd moved, but ends up further distracted with the settling of his warm hand — the leather of his glove soft and worn — over one of hers, gathering it and stealing her hitched breath as well.

...Stop holding my hand, she'd growled numerous times to Finn, on Jakku and in the stars; but now, here, she can't think of a single solitary gesture that she wants or needs more than this. Rey lifts her gaze to him again tremulously as though she knows what's to come, and the tears start once more — and with his other hand as he speaks, he tenderly brushes underneath her brimming eyes before they can spill over, soaking the leather with her tears.

And with that, Rey is undone. She weeps. Leans into him with a pull that's almost gravitational, the ache of pain and loss (and sorrow, and guilt) swallowing her in its peak. Not even the pull of her wound, the newly-formed scar down her spine, can stop her. ]

[unsea]

[ Though he has known Ren longer than Rey, he has yet to see that peculiar blade in a combat sense. Certainly, he knows it exists. The hilt, he has seen time and time again. On Ren's person, in Ahsoka's hands. The flicker of hot light, as he brushed through Ren's mind when they were stood in tandem against a rivals who thought they could not fight as one creature. Now, though. Now, he knows what it means to be cut-burned by a lightsaber. The distant echo of Rey's pain, when she was struck down. The tug of her scar now, as she moves and shifts, unable to remain still even when she's told to.

Stop holding my hand, and he nearly withdraws from her. He thinks, for a moment, that this is an active command, rather than a memory that he has coaxed to the surface of her mind.

Rey buckles, right into his hands. And, unwaveringly, he is there to catch and hold her. The shift of his figure closer to her, so that she does not pull badly at her wound, gathering her frame into his arms. It's not the first embrace he's given, not in his lifetime, knowing that while some flinched from contact, some craved it - especially at their weakest. He used to hold Genya, when she cried. Used to hold the Lantsov secondson, when he was but a child. He'd held Alina, when she was at her hungriest. Rey is like that, something in her is tender and needy, and she is of his unit. His brood. ] You'll retake what is yours, Rey.

[ ( he knows her name, heard it in her mind; finn's voice, han solo's voice - he doesn't know them, but through her he's made familiar ) ]

Your body will mend, your pride will follow. You have time, consider your advantages.

[sensitively]

[ She lets herself unravel in his arms, releasing all of her pent-up sadness at once, and it's a catharsis she hasn't known in what feels so, so long. On Jakku, tears had been a waste; hydration was precious in a rationed world where it meant the difference between life and death, and she'd learned very quickly as a young child that a night's worth of crying for her departed family would mean nearly depleting her resources the next morning.

But here, now, she gives in to it, to both that despair and bone-deep exhaustion. He is safety and comfort — this man whose name she doesn't yet know but she refers to him in the periphery of her mind as Darkness, because that's what she sees when she lets herself feel him out through the connection of their bond. Eventually though, after several moments her sobbing breaths synchronize, her tears recede. She's left hiccuping slightly, eyes red-rimmed and raw, her gaze far away over his shoulder as she thinks on his words. ]

You won't try to stop me? [ she voices aloud, throat cracking somewhat hoarsely over the words, ] Not even though my pain was broadcasted through the Brood?

[ inside, she's torn. ] ( This was my burden, my agony to bear. I didn't want to hurt anyone else; only him. )

[unsea]

[ While she cries, he considers.

The battle between Ren and Rey was something played out on both a local and a grand scale. Ceaseless and timeless, the positioning of the two over an item of great worth in both their minds meant that they would fight, and fight again. Where one would triumph, the other would soon retaliate. Rey was of his own. She was brood, in the way that he looked upon Ren and saw a brother. The juxtaposition of both of their existences ought to mean that he would be torn in two, trying to juggle his bond with her and his alliance with him. And that, would be where all would go wrong.

He was not a man who would be consumed by his loyalties. He would possess what was his, and lead. Not be led.

So, when Rey questions him, he answers with grave honesty: ] ( You're not alone. When you hurt, so do we.

I understand this, as much as I understand that you would pursue him again, and again, if I were to stop you. )

[sensitively]

[ Rey closes her eyes again, wearily, unable to voice for a moment — either with her voice or her thoughts — how reassuring it is to know that he understands both sides, the danger their Brood and the Nest at large could face by her confrontations with Ren, as well as her dogged determination to retrieve what's hers. After another moment to compose herself, though, she pulls away from his embrace; she's chastened by her emotional display, a little embarrassed given it's their first meeting, even if her catharsis had been too long in coming.

With the apparent link that her Brood feels where pain is concerned, as so many had attempted to warn her about, this too is something to consider carefully with regard to how she will approach her subsequent meetings with Ren — because she will have altercations with him, she's certain of it.

She shakes her head determinably, dark eyes gravid and serious. ] I won't — I'll try not to cause undue harm to my Brood, from now on.

I can't guarantee that Ren will refrain from violence, though. [ He's the one variable that she can count on to remain completely unpredictable, through everything. ]

[unsea]

[ He's known too many that were consumed by their personal battles and petty rivalries to count. Years upon years of experience, and it all boils down to the fact that if it truly threatens the nest as a whole - he'll end it. Completely, and without mercy. As it stands, Rey is newly arrived, her pain fresh and unabated by her skirmish with the one who'd caused it. Ren is... integrated among them, slightly more than she currently is. Seniority, and all that. ]

He has a brood that deeply enjoys -- [ meddling. ] Watching over him, let them be concerned with that.

[ As for you, Rey: ] The one who brought you here was Bellamy. I'm the one who prevented him from assisting you. It's for him that I'd like you to try, most of all.

[ In that regard, he might be the one who simply... let this all happen. But, he's honest. Bellamy has a good heart, where his own is gone. ]

[sensitively]

[ Let them be concerned with it. Easy to say, she wants to voice to him, and yet not likely as easy to manage; Ren fuels himself with the Dark side of the Force, with anger and hate and what she perceives is bloodlust, and she doesn't see how leaving his actions to the whims of those in his brood is prudent. She's curious about Ren's brood, now — wondering what kind of people comprise it, what sort of characters can deal with his twisted machinations.

Despite that, she doesn't lose focus on what the man before her is telling her. ]

Why Bellamy? [ A tilt of her chin; this close she can see the depths of his quartz-colored grey eyes, and she gazes into them in what's perhaps an overlong moment. ] Why not yourself?

[unsea]

Because Bellamy is all heart, [ the answer is plain, almost incredulous of the idea that he would ask her to do her best for any of them other than Bellamy. He's partial to his hatch-twin, the one who woke at the same time as him. The one he found first, among the beck and call of everyone else. Bellamy is all heart, and thinks he owes a blood debt that he'll repay, up to and including with his death. An idiot, but a good one. Rare, in the Darkling's experience. ]

And because where you are my brood, I look to Ren as one might a brother.

[ Despite that, he's not in anyone's pocket. He's simply picked bonds he'd created and tested their weight against the call of the brood. It's science, after all. ]

So, I let you both fight and took no side. He showed more mettle, don't you think?