[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

[regalled]

Yes, but you would die. We were only barely able to rescue you this time. [And they would not attempt it again. The danger was too great. Anyone who returned took their life and their death into their own hands.

There were less complicated ways to end your life.]

They were hunting you. They still are. If they sense your presence there again they will finish the job they started.

[The Nest's safety was not to be underestimated, nor was it to be taken for granted. It might not always be a haven.]

[tropism]

[ the knowledge that he can't go back makes him sad. it fills him like water spilling over a clay pot, cold in its finality as it drips over the rim. when giorno speaks, he is full of feeling, although he struggles, as always, to keep his composure. ]

Before I left - I had a dream. I wanted to protect my home. I wanted to make lives better. I wanted to destroy those who have plunged my city into a chaos of personal rivalries ....

It is a bit strange knowing that things will go on as they were, if only I stay away. Or - perhaps - someone will carry on my will, but I can't be there to see it happen, because returning would mean destroying that potential. [ a pause, and then he adds, almost mournfully, ] And I have left behind such good men. [ he calls them men, but really .... most of them were only older than he was by two years or three. people always seemed to grow up a lot faster in passione. ]

If we have the ability to travel across worlds, then I will hold on to the hope that one day I might see Naples again. Perhaps not as I remember it, but .... alive, and well. [ this one is more for himself than it is for prince. perhaps it's a foolish hope. but the possibility is there and giorno can't, won't discount it entirely. stranger things have happened. he has to remind himself that now, more than ever, he needs to have hope, to be resolute in the things he believes in and cares for. it'd be very easy to forget in a place like this, and while giorno is pragmatic, he also aches for what's familiar and is home to him. ]

I know you said that happiness is of no use here, but I must disagree. There is a story about a man condemned to push a rock to the top of a hill and back again - do you know this one? - even in his toil, one must imagine that he finds happiness in the work, somehow.

I will lend my strength to you. I care about my home, and I will do whatever it takes to protect it, though it makes me sad - terribly so - that I can never return to things as they were. [ for once, his sadness, his discontent over the whole situation, makes him look like the actual child that he is, and not the one he tries to so hard to present himself to be. it'd be useless to be angry to him. useless to tell him everything is unfair. it'd satisfy his frustrations to lash out to him, but it'll do nothing for him in the end.

the unwritten rule of fate was that all of those who are fated to meet will see each other again. giorno himself hadn't escaped that law back home. perhaps, in time, the answers will come to him like in the quiet way they have disrupted his life in naples, one ordinary morning when he was waiting at the airport after school. ]

[regalled]

[It was a composed answer, and far more level-headed than those Prince usually faced. Perhaps it would not last, in the face of the reality of the situation continuing past this day, but it was nevertheless refreshing. Prince had not had such an easy time abandoning his own ideas of his life, nor had he had such an easy time abandoning himself. Still, there were those better adapted to this life, and better suited.

Perhaps this boy was one of them.]

It is no easy thing to face. But you left them alive and well, and perhaps they will see what you wished come to be.

[He bites his instinct to respond quickly back, considers his words carefully. It was not an idiom from his home, but it bore some similarities to his own people's tales. Happiness, he cannot imagine, but satisfaction he could. Pride. Patience. Valuable things. He nods, acceptance of his offer, breaking his silence after a long pause.]

Very well. We cannot return to you what you have lost, but this place is your home now. Should you need anything, you may ask. When you return again to the Station, Cathaway and I will teach you what we know.

[And perhaps he would find some satisfaction in fighting back. Many had.]

[tropism]

I hope so. [ no, that wasn't right - giorno amends himself, and says, instead, ] I know they will.

[ but giorno isn't one to relish fighting ... he was not made for fighting. his stand was a defensive stand. it will be difficult to see how things will unfold for him from now on, but not entirely unpleasant; there is a certain kind of pleasure in being challenged.

and either way, he cannot really hold on to his grudges for too long. space seems too big, so beyond his existence that it would be a waste to deliberate on his anger and his sadness. it is enough that passione is somehow intact, and he has done laid the foundation of dissent with buccellati, back home, to ensure that his will will be carried. for now, he is reluctant to let go of don giovanna.

he supposes that the longer he stays - god knows how long - something like numbness will come to settle on this part of his mind until it bears no pain upon remembering. ]

Home ... there is something of a finality in that, is there. [ a frown. he's never had a home, and passione was always running away from death. ] It feels like I should be angrier at having given up things, but it really doesn't seem like that. A shift in priorities can hardly be called 'giving up', isn't that right?

In any case, there is no point about arguing over things that neither you nor I can control. And I look forward to learning from everyone, especially you and Cathaway.

[ but there is something that is missing here, something else that he was expecting from him. rather quietly, giorno murmurs, ] You haven't asked us to serve.

[ because giorno, in his place, would have. the threat of being outside of the nest would've been a good enough leverage in order to make most people stay, provided they take his words seriously. but prince hasn't done that, and giorno is wondering when it will come, or how he will phrase it. even in his kindest, giorno has only known violence as the currency of his land.

furthermore, his answer to that would've been a 'no', without hesitation; and he supposes that most people would answer the same too. more than that - one doesn't plant living things into a body without expecting a certain kind of use, or at least that's how it was back in naples. the arrow and its trials weren't for fun. it created stand users in order to dominate the populace and terrorize other gangs. giorno doesn't see the symbiote's existence as an altruism, but he does wonder at what else could it be. ]

[regalled]

I appreciate that. [He spent more than enough time arguing over things that couldn't be changed. With others, with himself. It was enough to exhaust anyone, even someone like him.

The statement that follows however, near enough to a question, is followed by a long, uncomfortable silence. It is a difficult answer to give. Yes. No. Both and neither.]

We won't ask you to serve, but we will ask for your help. [A faint distinction.]

We have no king, but we do have a mission. To fight the ones that hunt us. For a myriad of reasons. We seek out signs of their activity and attempt to thwart them where we find their interference. We believe your stake in this is as great as any of the rest of us.

[tropism]

Some would say that's not a choice at all. [ a quiet murmur. ] It is already difficult to think about .... the kinds of things that one's life is actually subject to, if you look beyond your own day-to-day existence.

But you don't exactly stay here for gratitude, or anything close to it. [ giorno frowns. ] May I ask what's in it for you?