onemind: (Default)
THE N E S T ([personal profile] onemind) wrote in [community profile] station722016-08-14 01:13 pm

[hatch log] pull plug, enter multiverse

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.))




cognitived: (pic#8153352)

[personal profile] cognitived 2016-08-20 01:10 am (UTC)(link)
[ Clint's a spy, and a damned good one if he did say so himself, so there's no real way he missed the waver in Bruce's walk. It's small, nothing more than a little blip on the radar, but it's there. In the flesh, beneath his muscle and bone and blood. Broodmate, written deep into the very code of them both.

Fletching, beneath his fingers; red hair, soft lullabies; breath in, out, again, again -- wisps of his own slip free even as he calms.

Well, nothing to be done about it now. Clint merely draws back as much as he can, winding back behind crumbling walls, faint apology and resignation in the touch of his mind. It's hard to fully disengage, but Clint gets it, he really does. His own unease is old, muddled, veining beneath it all. ]


Yeah, the first few days are rough. [ More than a little rough, if you're a paranoid assassin with mind control issues. Still, he leads the way up to the roof, some of the mental noise spiraling away behind their feet. It's not quite far enough to truly feel alone in their heads, especially with company, but it's better. Easier. ] It gets easier to get a hold of.
batmotif: (08)

[personal profile] batmotif 2016-08-20 06:51 pm (UTC)(link)
[Bruce catches ghosts of Clint's own images, not knowing exactly what to do with them. Out of pure stubbornness, he divorces himself from his innate curiosity to delve in deeper, and succeeds with the help of his broodmate distancing himself. He's successful, though the feelings linger, like handprints that haven't yet faded.

It's going to take a while for him to get used to that. Ideally, he'll not have to get used to it at all, but Bruce knows more than most that "ideally" is often just an illusion. He sets his jaw, tells himself for once to focus externally than internally, a backwards practice for him.]


"Easier", or we just condone the fact that we're all in each other's heads?

[His words seem to echo in the stairwell, as if accentuating the obvious cynicism behind the question itself.]
cognitived: (pic#8153305)

[personal profile] cognitived 2016-08-30 08:45 pm (UTC)(link)
[ It's hard to avoid, these days. The shattering, fracturing, ghosts. They linger beneath the tombstones of his teeth, gleaming behind the once prison of his gaze. Bruce doesn't delve deeper, but they're there. Clint's body is a graveyard.

Still, the ebb and flow of their minds settle, the slip slide of sand beneath fingertips. They aren't separate, but -- the illusion of it holds them back, dams of kelp trying in vain to protect sandcastles from the rising tide. Breathe in, out. Hold. Try to remember who you are, without the fingers curling in your thoughts.

It's easier, as they speak, Bruce's cynicism well worn. Clint snorts, a sharp, final sound in the echoing stairwell. ]


Bit of column a, bit of column b.

[ Maybe he's a bit cynical on his own. ]
batmotif: (08)

[personal profile] batmotif 2016-09-01 12:06 am (UTC)(link)
[Bruce raises a brow. There's that lingering tone of familiar cynicism that he can easily recognize in himself. It doesn't make him any happier about the situation, but he prefers the honesty.]

So straddling the fence? That's a quickest road to apathy, you know.

[Something that he doesn't want to ever feel. Apathy was its own sort of acceptance, and he certainly didn't ever want to accept that being stuck in the far reaches of space with a symbiote in his head was his ultimate fate.]
cognitived: (pic#8153244)

[personal profile] cognitived 2016-09-08 01:50 am (UTC)(link)
[ Funny thing, for a spy and an assassin, Clint tends to prefer honesty too. Lying on a mission's not necessarily the best option out there after all. Besides, it seems to have resonated with his new broodmate, and building a rapport isn't a bad idea at all.

There's a huff of laughter, mouth curling with faint amusement. He agrees, and yet. ]


Yeah, probably. [ Up ahead, the door to the roof looms, and Clint steps forward to muscle it open. ] Dwelling on it isn't much worse though.

[ It's quieter up here. Not quite silent, especially with the company, but easier to manage. Especially since Clint's trying his best to keep from slipping up and spilling memories and thoughts. ]
batmotif: (04)

[personal profile] batmotif 2016-09-09 12:04 am (UTC)(link)
[The quiet is a welcome change to the bustling below (mostly mental, he realizes). The city skyline is magnificent, in its own sort of way -- alive with lights and the murmur of transportation below. It breathed, just like Gotham did, but to a different rhythm. A different sort of synchronicity in its pulsing streets.

Clint is right, of course. Dwelling on the problem does not make it solve itself, but Bruce is a man who is an expert on dwelling. On problems that need solving, even if their solutions lie beyond their current grasp.

A part of him can feel Clint's efforts to keep his thoughts to himself. Bruce wonders if it's merely because his link is closer, his mind more likely to brush up against his own. He'll not disrupt the man's efforts, and so he remarks on something else instead.]


This is a far cry from the station. [All Euclidean shapes and insectoid architecture.] A strangely human city, for an alien world.