[hatch log] the stealth ship's running out of fuel

[onemind]

CHARACTERS: All
WHERE: The Station + Concordia
WHEN: DAY :29 - :30
SUMMARY: A new brood hatches; two new hosts arrive in Concordia.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary.

YOU WAKE UP. Something is different - something unnamable, but palpable. You aren't the same person you were the last time you were aware of yourself.

You might not know it right away, though. What you do know: you're in a just slightly claustrophobic compartment. A gentle white light diffuses from the top panel. You're wearing the clothes you remember from wherever you came from. You feel... good - regardless of what condition you might have been in before you came to this place. 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. Lastly, there’s a faint pinch at the base of your skull. Reach back to it and there's a small cable connected to the base of your neck and running back into the rear wall of the compartment. Disconnect it. Then it’s not so quiet anymore. Wherever here is, you aren't alone. You can feel that in your head: something big taking up space.

Welcome to Station 72, Mara and Murphy. All new hosts will have one day aboard the Station before being whisked off to Concordia to join the others. Get to know one another, ask the guardians of the Station - Prince and Cathaway - any burning questions you might have, explore Station 72. At the end of the day, a slick stealth shuttle will arrive in the hangar to take you to Concordia.

The pilot of the craft of a young man who buzzes across the fresh mental connection. It's loud enough to be irritating; he apologizes for it a few times during the trip through the pieces of the multiverse, as the ship pops into existence over the planet, and descends into the bustling inner city of Concordia in the dark hours of the morning on DAY 30. Nirad lands the stealth craft in a garden district; once you've disembarked, the ship reverts to an autopilot sequence and lifts off of it's own accord.

From there, it's just a short tram ride to the Bearings Apartment block building. The hosts, Nirad explains, have rented out Level 13. There are still some empty rooms there if you want one (you probably want one). That said-- if you don't want to go to Bearings and meet your new family comrades in arms ...friends...?

No one's stopping you. But some of them might come looking.

---

((OOC Notes: This is a mini-hatch log for Mara Jade and John Murphy; on-Station prompts should be closed to either one another or Station NPCs, but Concordia prompts may be open to everyone.

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

[polyphonos]

[Yes, that sometimes comes up as well. She reaches the center of the deck and halts, regarding him there with his back to the wall; her attention is, at least for the moment, all patience - mild as milk, gentle as a summer breeze. The smile she's adopted is easy, understanding, sympathetic.]

We're afraid that would be impossible without damaging your brain. If you insist on having it done anyway, we won't stop you - but we refuse to assist you in hurting yourself.

[wrackful]

[The image comes to mind, briefly, of the device Clarke had carried, the ramshackle contraption designed to destroy and then extract ALIE's chips. Then of Clarke herself, fitting in the throne, not enough nightblood in her system for her to survive the flame being in her head. Murphy isn't a nightblood, and the fear is there, suddenly, the idea of his brain cooking out of his ears.]

How do you know it isn't doing damage anyway? [Not a nightblood, not Clarke, and seemingly still in control of himself, not one of ALIE's army.] Why did you even put it in?

[polyphonos]

Oh, but it is. [She seems unconcerned, a steady warm presence against the murmur of anxiety humming from his end of the link stretched between them.] You are merely suitable for the symbiote, not perfect for it. As it settles, your mind is forced to adapt to its presence. Some would consider the side effect of that damage, though we find them useful to our continued survival. For example, [and this, in answer to his second question:] without the symbiote, you couldn't live on the Station long. Existence between the multiverses isn't kind to most minds. The symbiote serves to stabilize our presence here; the network between one mind and the next helps to manufacture a sense of time and space.

[These are good, thoughtful questions. She approves of them, however rooted they are in-- paranoia? anger? a flash of resentment, maybe?]

Some would say this is the unfortunate cost of survival. The alternative is to be killed in some way or another.

[wrackful]

[His blood runs cold. She's smiling, friendly, telling him his brain is going to be forced to adapt. She might as well be ALIE, another version, another fucked up means to a seemingly good end.]

So, what, you saved me because you need something for this thing to live in?

[There hadn't been time to think, in the moment, but he should have known. No one ever did anything for nothing. This catch was just more than he ever could have imagined.]

[polyphonos]

No. [It's curt, so blunt that it has to be honesty. --Right?] We saved you because the alternative was your murder by the hands of our enemy. Perhaps there are people elsewhere who are suitable to the symbiote but haven't been detected by the thing that wants to wipe us out. Those people are welcome to live their lives unscathed in the places they should. But we will not allow our enemy to claim your life if it's avoidable.

This [she motions to the nesting deck, to the series of empty chambers, to him and where he stands now clutching the ladder] is merely the alternative to your death. We admit it isn't ideal, but most find it preferable to nonexistence.

[wrackful]

[Amusement rises, bitter, morbid. Their enemy. So this was another war he's somehow been caught up in. Another war where he had no interest in supporting either side.]

This. [The nesting deck, she'd said. Nesting, like for eggs. God, he does not want to think about what's in his head.

The other chambers are empty. Either he's the only one, or they're not planning on keeping him in this room.]

Station, you said. That means space station, right? [Right back where he'd started.] I can already tell you how well that's gonna work out.

[polyphonos]

More or less. Station 72 exists in a multiversal pocket or node. We aren't really in space as much as we are between it. [She lifts her hands as if to elaborate with a gesture, a faint jingling from the sway of the metallic charms up and down the length of her arms, and then appears to change her mind in the face of his... perhaps it's certainty. It feels like something related to that.] But yes. Essentially.

[A fixed look, attention piqued:]

Have you been in space before?

[Not all hosts had, but a history of advanced travel tended to make things easier on their minds. She suspects they're less likely to be overloaded by the symbiote, by what will eventually be required of them.]

[wrackful]

[She talks like a science class he'd prefer not to be paying attention to. It makes it all the easier to resolve more of his usual attitude together, like pieces being put back together over the turmoil of waking up here.]

Yeah, just seventeen straight years.

[Time was he'd expected to live out his entire life there, whether that was just another few months or years. There wasn't any other future. Then he'd set foot on the ground, and any solid idea of what the future might be had vanished.]

I was in prison, right at the end of that. I set fire to a guard's quarters.

[Just in case she needed a clearer idea of his attitude towards authority.]

[polyphonos]

Ah.

[Yes, she's known a few of those. In fact-- Cathaway smiles and the pulse of the bond between their minds murmurs toward affection, familiarity. She touches her fingertips to her breastbone.] This one had three insubordination charges in her home universe.

[She's unconcerned. One way or another, everything resolves itself in the end.]

But that's good. Your familiarity with that life might help you here and elsewhere. Not everyone knows what we know when they first wake up here. Space is dangerous and hungry and it will be good for the young hatches to have your perspective.

[wrackful]

Pass.

[It's dry, unimpressed, aggressively covering over how unsteady her reaction leaves him. Her feelings coming at him, pressing into his mind.]

I'm not the helpful type.

[Everything she says leaves him with more questions. How many others were there, how long had this been going on, why the hell she referred to herself like that. But he's unsettled, now he isn't wrapped up in the immediate anger and fear. Unsettled by her, and his gaze darts past her to the door, back again.]

[polyphonos]

That's a shame.

[She sounds, looks, feels unconcerned. He'll either learn to be or he'll come to know what the consequences of selfishness were. She might encourage the former, but can hardly stop him from choosing the latter. Luckily the historical probability for the former is high: self preservation is a defining feature of most species.

Meanwhile:] Did you have any other questions for us? We'll do everything in our power to see that you're as comfortable as you can be here until you've left to meet the others.

[wrackful]

[That surprises him, draws his attention back solidly onto her instead of half working on the idea of walking past her and away. Leaving. Seventeen years of experience in space, but he'd only left once, and that had been a one-way trip. Instinctively, he'd assumed it would be the same here.]

And where're they?

[polyphonos]

[Her attention grows fixed. Anchored.]

They're on the planet called Opia, in the great city of Concordia. Are you familiar with cities, John Murphy?

[wrackful]

[He doesn't bother correcting her on his name, but it still strikes a chord of dislike. More than the fact he hadn't given it to her.]

No. They're history where I'm from.

[Polis was the closest, but he wasn't stupid enough to think that was anything like how they had been. Anything like a great city.]

You could know that, couldn't you. Same way you know my name.

[Grabbed out of his head via the thing that's in there now. All of his knowledge and memories open to her. Just like ALIE. And no way he can stop it.]

[polyphonos]

[The point of her attention doesn't waver, doesn't soften. She smiles. It's pleasant, not at all predatory.]

We could. But it's rude.

[The Prince wouldn't like it if she flexed their connection more than she already has, though it would make this significantly easier. Patience, she tells herself. All things in good time.

She tips her face to him, the pin straight sheet of her grey hair swaying faintly.]

In any case, I hope you enjoy your time below then. New experiences help us grow.

[wrackful]

[Anyone caring about being rude with him is almost funny enough to make him laugh. It's restrained to a bitter, sharp smile, the accompanying comment that he doesn't care about rudeness cut off. He does care, in this instance. He doesn't want her in his head.

She can probably see that.]

Yeah, unless they kill you.

[Says his experience of new experiences. But maybe some great city would be different.]

[polyphonos]

[Is there such thing as a non-reaction? If so, she has one: inert, easy, as unaffected as a small pebble in some remote ditch.]

We find that sometimes assists other people regardless. But yes, that's unfortunately true. Luckily, so far the survival rate for this planet seems to be fairly good. You're statistically unlikely to have harm come to you there.

[It's not impossible, that much is obvious - but one out of more than two dozen young hosts wasn't a terrible rate of loss.]

[wrackful]

[Not different, then. He watches her face and wonders if he can hate her as much as Jaha for talking about survival rates like they're just numbers. Acceptable loss. She's still more like ALIE, as much as she might be flesh and bone. A shell of something that can't know better.]

So these others, did you 'save' them like me?

[It doesn't add up. She'd made it sound like it was important he was safe, because of being suitable for something being shoved in his brain. But if they were that important, they wouldn't be risked.]

Rescue people and then drop them on other planets to maybe die, for what? What do you want?

[polyphonos]

That's right.

[It's a simplification to say agents of the nest 'saved' anyone, but she won't bother to clarify it in the moment when he's set to dig his heels about it anyway. Bickering over semantics won't change that, will it?

Her patience is persistent, still like some very deep pool or the black of space. If she feels anything in the moment, it's dark enough to be obscured against the backdrop.]

To learn our enemy's tactics and motivations so we can stop following them and instead begin to act offensively. We would prefer not to spend our lives hunted, but at the moment our options are limited to self-preservation and undoing their work. We can understand if you'd prefer to live on the Station forever, but some hosts don't find the idea appealing.

[wrackful]

[The strategy of it is one he can understand. He could maybe even support it, if this was his war. It isn't. He wasn't interested in playing soldier on the ground, and he isn't interested in it here.]

And what happens if I don't want to do either?

[polyphonos]

[She makes a small motion as if to spread her hands, the narrowness of her shoulders twitching; it's not quite a shrug, but it's very close to one.]

We can force you to do nothing, John. But we encourage you to do nothing that would compromise this Station or the lives of other hosts.

[And if he didn't follow that encouragement? Well. She prefers not to dwell on such possibilities; they are unpleasant.]

[wrackful]

You're wrong. You've already forced me.

[And they can do it again. Defiance is a well-worn path for him, and with it comes a honed sense for power. When he has it, when he doesn't, how much, where the balance is. He doesn't have the upper hand here. He doesn't even have anything he could call leverage. All he has is belligerence, resistance, disregard. He smiles, mouth tugging flat.]

Guess I should go take a look around.

[Before they drop him in the great city. He moves, finally, to walk past her and out of the room.]

[polyphonos]

[And she cedes ground accordingly to allow him past. There's a faint chime of the small metal charms about her person as she does so, an easy murmur of metallic sound that's strangely (unnaturally) pleasant to the ear when coupled with the pervasively patience, understanding, feeling sensation that lingers about her end of their mental connection.]

Of course. If you have any other questions, don't hesitate to ask us or the Prince.