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.))




snippycup: those days are gone, those days are gone (felt like i was walking on a tight rope)

works for meeeee

[personal profile] snippycup 2016-08-28 08:02 am (UTC)(link)
[As a child raised in the temples of the Jedi, Ahsoka feels the untempered and untrained rake of the Force across her mind like another person might feel a newborn's nails unknowingly scratch across their skin. She isn't prepared for it, and a piece of her mind recoils defensively -- the mind those nails are attached to is not a young mind. She feels its callouses, the heat and the grit of sand, the bite of loneliness.

That last bit is what tempers her reaction to Rey's sudden appearance in her doorway. Her eyes come a bit further into focus, and she sets her socket wrench aside in favor of standing to properly greet her visitor.]


Shouldn't that be the question I ask? You are the one who reached out to me, after all.

[A cheeky reply that she can't stop herself from making. The truth is, while she might have recovered partially, the idea of being left alone is undeniably appealing.

And also immeasurably dangerous, with the Dark Side now hanging so heavily in the Bearings.]


My name is Ahsoka Tano.
sensitively: videnda (pic#9973853)

[personal profile] sensitively 2016-09-05 05:23 am (UTC)(link)
[ Ahsoka's cheekiness doesn't bother her in the slightest. Rey is too busy taking her in, visually and mentally, and slowly coming to a realization as she does. ]

— You're a Jedi. I was told —

[ Han Solo had explained to her what had happened to Luke Skywalker's padawans, that one boy, an apprentice, had turned against him and destroyed it all — his son — but he hadn't told her about any that had survived. ]

— I was told there were none of you left. None of you besides Luke.
snippycup: when i lost control over it all (Default)

[personal profile] snippycup 2016-09-05 05:39 am (UTC)(link)
[Ahsoka's offered smile is understanding but she can't stop the sink of her heart when Rey corroborates General Hux's claim about the Jedi -- that their Order will one day fall, and that their remnants would be scattered across the galaxy. If that were true, then...

No. She can't bear to think of that now.]


I am sorry to disappoint you, but I am not a Jedi -- not anymore.

[She doesn't know the Luke she refers to, and likely never would if she hadn't already met him. Rather than stand and dwell on the world she can't change, she nudges Scrappy aside with a gentle press of the Force and offers Rey a seat beside her.]

Come. No need to stand in the doorway.
sensitively: (pic#10141883)

[personal profile] sensitively 2016-09-05 05:46 am (UTC)(link)
[ Her feet move obediently, as if her body is on autopilot, and Rey steps into her room, in from the doorway to the hall. Her expression, though, falls dejectedly when Ahsoka denies the title. ]

But you have to be. I feel it. Everything I know through the Force, tells me you are. The children —

[ — wondrous expressions, faces of pure light and delight, of gentle teachings and wisdom and the first sparking flash of a lightsaber — ] — you were one of them. You trained with them, in a temple, in that city — or planet, I don't know which — that sparkles like a million stars at night.

If you were once one, how can you not be one, now?
snippycup: i gave you my all (but i gave it my all)

[personal profile] snippycup 2016-09-05 01:04 pm (UTC)(link)
[Rey's wonder does an excellent job of distracting her. She pays the space beside her as an invitation and takes a seat again herself. Her smile loses some of its luster.

Leaving the Jedi Order had been necessary, but that didn't mean that she didn't miss it. When Rey reminds her of all the younglings who looked up to her, she can't ignore the guilt that quietly gnaws at her gut.]


It's...complicated. Perhaps I will explain another time, when I am more equipped to give to a proper explanation.

[She tilts her head curiously in Rey's direction. She clearly had untapped potential, after all -- she didn't need to be a Jedi master to see that.]

Tell me your name.
sensitively: (pic#10151843)

[personal profile] sensitively 2016-09-15 12:08 am (UTC)(link)
[ Rey comes closer and takes a seat beside her, obediently — still with an edge of the caution she usually possesses, but most of it worn away by curiosity and yearning. ]

— Rey, [ she volunteers, almost immediately. Unlike some of her previous encounters with other Nestmates, there is something about Ahsoka's demeanor that inspires a degree of trust. Perhaps it's her origins, but in addition to that Rey can sense a solemnity...guilt, profound sadness. ]

Tell me everything, [ she prods, impatiently. ] I want to know.
snippycup: hard to give (i remember when you found it)

[personal profile] snippycup 2016-09-15 01:02 am (UTC)(link)
[In that moment, Ahsoka sees much of herself in the older woman -- when she was young, particularly impatient with the world set before her and wanting to learn everything at once. But there was no way to tell a girl, who clearly looked up to the idea of the Jedi, that the Jedi Order was corrupt in its own way. Corrupted by its own mission, and too focused to see where it was leading them.

So she just smiles with the same understanding.]


Patience, Rey. It is one of the first things they teach in the temples to younglings.

[She folds her hands on her lap and really looks at Rey for the first time. She was never brought to the temples, given her hunger for knowledge and clearly wild power -- just as Anakin had been forgotten, she remembers. Or perhaps, there were no temples to return to.

Her fears had already been confirmed by General Hux, but it was another thing to see them manifest in such a lonely girl.]


You're right. I was raised in the temples from a very young age. Temples that I understand may no longer exist.

[That part is hard for her to say, but she says it all the same, enough that her brow furrows a little.]

For you, the Clone Wars have been over for many years. For me, they were still raging before I came to the Nest.
sensitively: (calm)

[personal profile] sensitively 2016-09-18 06:16 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Patience. She knows and suspects it's a Jedi virtue and tenet — unfortunately patience hasn't always served her, not as a foraging scavenger. It doesn't come quite as easily to Rey as it should.

She refrains from pushing further and instead watches the younger girl as she folds her hands in her lap and takes a long, appraising look. Ahsoka assesses her with the same sort of calm she imagines Luke Skywalker would have, had she had the opportunity to meet him; a calm born of training, experience with centering oneself and mastering emotions. Something she's woefully lacking.

Her brows lift in surprised understanding, when Ahsoka clarifies their different timelines. ]
So, you're not — you're from the time of the Clone Wars? That's from a long time before I was born.

[ She shakes her head, somewhat forlornly. ] ...Then, it's true. The Jedi are gone, except for Luke Skywalker.
snippycup: i want it all (cause i want it all)

[personal profile] snippycup 2016-09-21 03:15 am (UTC)(link)
[Skywalker.

The wound is too fresh, and it cuts through her like a spear, forcing her to drop her gaze to her lap. Luke Skywalker.

She had taken Kylo Ren's admission of relation to her master with a cup of salt, but then in one breath, Rey names his son...or what she images will be his son. The son Anakin would never know, the son he had clearly longed for and mourned during his time with the nest.

And now, somewhere in the universe, a son without a father. It almost hurts her more than the realization that the conclave she called "family" had essentially been slaughtered thanks to their own blindness.

But at least Luke Skywalker was alive, where his father was not. That would please Anakin, she thinks. It doesn't comfort her.]


I--suppose so. I'm sorry.

[She never should have left. Nothing solidified that thought more than the fact that Anakin was now dead.]
sensitively: <user name="avali"> (pic#10291356)

[personal profile] sensitively 2016-09-22 05:31 am (UTC)(link)
[ She's stricken into silence at the realization that something she's said has wounded Ahsoka, and Rey bites her lip. Understanding hits her like a ton of durasteel. ]

...You're from before his time; you knew his father. [ a beat. ]

Ren's grandfather. Anakin. Didn't you. Was it before he'd aligned himself with the Empire?
snippycup: cause you didn't know how (those days are gone)

[personal profile] snippycup 2016-09-22 06:00 am (UTC)(link)
He was my Master.

[Soft. Quiet. Something she has said so many times before. Her eyes fall to the small box beside her, where the little gem sits nestled inside.]

We should speak on another topic.

[She can't think about Anakin now -- the future Anakin must already have, the future that would never be. No matter how her stomach twists for answers that are so close to her fingertips, the Force pulses a warning to her. To continue to search for those answers that Rey (and Ren) must have would lead her to ruin.

And she was already so close. So she pushes it away.]
sensitively: (pic#10141884)

[personal profile] sensitively 2016-09-22 06:47 am (UTC)(link)
Your...Master?

[ Rey can't help the perplexed furrowing of her brow, as she asks — Master, to a Jedi padawan. Ahsoka had been his apprentice...before he'd turned to the Dark side, before he'd become Darth Vader.

She wants to apologize, to atone for the simple fact that she's dredged up what are perhaps sore and discomfiting memories, but she can only claim poor interpersonal skills and an unbridled curiosity about the legendary Skywalker clan. ]


...Which battles did you fight in, during the Clone Wars?

snippycup: and i want it all, i want it all (and i know that now)

[personal profile] snippycup 2016-09-25 06:51 pm (UTC)(link)
[That's an easier topic, but not the easiest. Looking back at the battles, all Ahsoka could see was an unnecessary loss of life. Everything felt unnecessary, now that she had learned what would become of the Order itself.]

Too many. Felucia. Christophis. Teth. Saleucami. Geonosis.

[She thinks nothing on how Rey questions after the term "Master". Eventually, she will figure it out if she has the knowledge of the Jedi that she seems to -- knowledge of their culture that was to commonplace.]

All equally devastating for both sides, regardless of who won.
sensitively: (pic#10151814)

[personal profile] sensitively 2016-09-25 07:36 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Ahsoka must surely sense that she doesn't really want to talk about battles, about losses on both sides, about war and devastation. It's as likely evident on Rey's face as is her slight wince of discomfort when she moves, the newly-formed scar along her spine pulling and sparking a frisson of pain.

Tentatively — or at least as carefully as she possibly can, given her temperament — she tries again. ]


But the Jedi won, didn't they?

...At least until they were all hunted down.
snippycup: cause you didn't know how (those days are gone)

[personal profile] snippycup 2016-09-26 06:49 am (UTC)(link)
We didn't always win. The Battle on Felucia ended in the Republic's retreat.

[She knows what she really wants to know -- perhaps she might be selfish in dodging the real question. The Jedi weren't as good as they wanted everyone to believe. They'd been deceived, their arrogance having turned them into absolutists, unable to conceive that they had seen something incorrectly.

But she can't tell a yearning girl that -- someone so obviously desperate for hope.]


The Jedi were meant to be neutral, after all. It just happened that the Separatist army was in the business of taking innocent lives way too often.