[hatch log] +1, +2, +3, ...+4?

[onemind]

CHARACTERS: All
WHERE: The Station + Concordia
WHEN: DAY :35 - :36
SUMMARY: Another hatch occurs on the Station; new hosts arrive on Concordia and make their way to Bearings - along with a special guest.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary.

YOU WAKE UP and you will never be the person you were a moment ago. --No. Not a moment. It's been a while, hasn't it? Something feels different. You know intuitively that you've been unconscious for more than just a blink of the eye.

Which might explain how you ended up here: lying in a small faintly hexagonal chamber, a gentle white light emanating from the surrounding walls. It might also explain why any injuries you might have experienced immediately before your escape are also well on their way to being healed. There's something strangely peaceful about waking up here and that feeling persists as you find the tube running from the base of your neck to the compartment's rear wall. But when you disconnect the tube-- Things get loud. A wave of emotion fills the void. Fear, uncertainty, relief, a sense of purpose or loneliness or anxiety; maybe some of these emotions are yours, but they can't all be. After the initial sensory overload, the mental buzz elongates: stretches out into a murmur like the sound of a party behind a closed door.

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. Drop down the ladder to the floor of the Nesting Deck and you’ll find you’re not alone - and that those sounds in your head are louder. Other people’s thoughts swim up: some of them might seem clear, but most of them are a jumbled mess. Every single person here feels like someone you should be familiar with, someone you somehow know. They might look like strangers, but there's something about them that's absolutely vital on a cellular level.

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 your brood members, 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 plans are being put into motion. Stealth missions are being plotted, espionage-laden ploys are being quietly organized, and somewhere Sam Alexander is probably puking into a bucket. If you aren't following someone suspicious - well, maybe you should be? It definitely seems to be in vogue.

But it can't all be derring-do and covert operations; early on Day 35, Carata disappears. Nirad says she's gone to the Station. "I don't know how many more times we'll be able to do this. Someone's going to notice the ship and start asking questions." And maybe some of those questions might lead someone their way. After all, they haven't exactly been keeping a low profile have they?

     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, the rest of your brood is waiting for you.

     IN CONCORDIA
AS NIGHT FALLS IN CONCORDIA, the transport drops into atmosphere and lands in an gutted strip of an industrial waste facility. Once everyone's disembarked, the transport lifts off of its own volition and winks out of sight as its stealth routines come back online. A few minutes later, a transport van arrives being driven by a stoic android. Carata and the other new hosts pile in. It's a long drive to the Bearings Apartment Block, but it feels undeniably like home when they finally reach the Level 13 living space. New hosts are invited to make themselves comfortable. There are as of yet unclaimed rooms, each of which features a customizable digital display wall (pick your color or wallpaper!); there's a fully stocked kitchen (if someone took time to do the grocery shopping) and a great view overlooking Beta Block from the common room. Get familiar with the other hosts, take a well deserved nap or--

     JUST KIDDING.
In the excitement of new hosts arriving, it might be easy to miss it when the powerlift drops back to the lobby a few hours after the arrival of the new hosts. But it's impossible to overlook the android that arrives on Level 13 when it returns. It's stripped down to its most basic parts: a metallic skeleton with a featureless face plate and bright blue ocular inputs, sparks flashing through its internal synthetic viscera like firing synapses.

It looks like a nightmare.

Its jaw unhinges: "I'm looking for Sim Anderson," it says and then abruptly powers down.

---

((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. Any threads on Concordia can be open to both new and old hosts!

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

CRAWLS SLOWLY TOWARDS

[cur]

And you'd be quite right.

[ Fight or flight, the low current of anger at being taken out of his element — it's all there, stifled and with nowhere to go. On the surface, all it really registers as is a sort of bemused tension, like he's stuck on a particularly annoying crossword.

Whatever this is, it isn't this girl's fault. He knows that as well as he knows his own confusion. Deciding she isn't a threat doesn't negate the rest of it, though, so he doesn't rush to pocket his wand; it's still held absently at his side, half out of habit. Hers isn't, which either means she's lost it or doesn't have one, neither of which lends clarity to the situation.

He almost asks if she's American, but the answer's already there. Accent aside, he hears it in the whisper of city traffic and the flicker of landmarks he's only seen in photographs — it's unsettling. It feels like prying. It also feels a lot like magic, which makes the next question slightly less of a gamble. ]

You're from the North American school? Ilvermorny?

[quivers]

[ So there it is. She isn't alone. But somehow, she'd already known that, already known that there was another here. And another besides that? She thinks so.

But this one, she feels strongest of all right now. The unsettling simmer that flows through, it flows through her too. Though some of it might be a reflection of her own natural discomfort. She's used to ending up in random spaces — dimension hopping made that a little easier — but it's possibly the confinement of this room that's most put her at an unease. The tubes didn't help either. ]

The North American school? What? [ She shakes her head, trying to register the world. ] Ill what money?

[ She's squinting her eyes, trying to solve that little riddle. She can confirm she's from North America, he's got that right, but what — oh. She gets distracted. Something's lingering there, a feeling like smoke, like a puff of something. Is this a smoker? No, it's something else. Suddenly Billy's magic is in the forethought of her mind for some reason, something lit from the hands. No, not the hands. There's a —

Wand. She sees it now, lingering in his fingers. There's only a few things that could be associated with a wand. ] Uhh, magician? Warlock? Wizard?

[cur]

[ Wrong gamble, then. It's more a disappointment than a tactical error, a bid for familiarity outside of the unnatural pull that's got them both rooted. Her butchery of Ilvermorny earns a small smile in spite of it, but before Remus has the chance to correct her or ask something else (or use a spell, possibly), her thoughts shift.

There's something very much like the crackle of magic in her mind, then the image is gone. At the mention of his wand, Remus gives it a quick glance.

All things a Muggle could guess at. The difference is that there's no skepticism or judgment or fear, and his eyes are narrowed in thought when he looks back to Kate. ]

Wizard. Do you know many magicians and warlocks?

[quivers]

[ She tries to think of the heroes who might use wands but it's pretty unfamiliar in the real world. Maybe in books (she can actually think of a few notable sources), but there wasn't a flake of fiction to this. But even if the weapon choice isn't familiar, it's not weird. I mean, if people could sling webs around, wand is as normal as you can get. ]

Oh. Wizard. Sweet, sweet. Yeah, you could say that. Best friend makes things happen with magic spells, his mom warps entire realities and then they work with Doctor Strange who happens to be pretty weird. Imagine that, right? What would have given that away? Talks a magic eyeball a lot.

[ She offers a casual shrug, these things not being anything out of the ordinary for her. But that doesn't matter. This guy — there's something peculiar in the familiarity of him. Here's a mix of quiet and loud all at once, like something roaring but holding back together.

Kate raises her hands, holding them up palms out. ] No magic here. Totally boring human with a bow and arrow. [ She gestures with a chin to her back, the aforementioned bow and a quiver latched there. ]

[cur]

[ The nonchalance rolling off of her is disarming on more front than one, and Remus gradually lets go of his caution. By the time she finishes the first line of thought, he's wearing a wry smile, amused in spite of his confusion.

Warping realities. That's well beyond the scope of any magic he's heard of, but it'd certainly explain a few things. ]

A bow and arrow that you're very good with.

[ That isn't an assumption. It's something he knows, instinctively; maybe because Kate knows it. Remus thinks briefly of trick arrows that make very little sense, irritation tugging at the connection as he draws his focus back. ]

Your friend's mother. Has she ever done anything on this scale?

[quivers]

[ That you're very good with. She can't collect where he gathers this from, but it's a bit of a stroke to her ego to hear it from a complete stranger. No, not a stranger. She keeps getting that part confused for some reason.

But her lips are definitely twisting into a smile. Either way, however he picks up on it, he knows she's good with a bow. That's a good enough start. ]

That's the common word, yeah.

[ She's got a lot of pride and she doesn't very well know how to hold that back, even under the current circumstances. ]

That's — actually, in a way. I mean, I don't know if it would be related to anything like this but she changed the entire history of the world once. Made everyone believe they were someone else entirely from who they were. [ Kate quickly realizes this is hardly comforting. ] I don't think this is that though.

[cur]

[ He's never been particularly good at condemning anyone for arrogance, and it doesn't seem as though he'll be starting now. He smiles at her candid response, obvious amusement sweeping over the connection even as his brow furrows in confusion.

Magic on that scale is nothing he's heard of, for good reason. There are glimpses of memory that seep through, images of witches and wizards and light, sometimes in short flashes and sometimes more distinct; a skull, green and bright. A red flash that's met with the crash of stone as it's torn up from the streets.

But that's all very tame, by comparison. When the memories flicker out, it's only because he's moved on — not because he's caught on to any deeper connection. ]

A better explanation than I've got, in any case. What makes you think it's something else?