station72 | [hatch log] into the garbage chute, flyboy(s)

Entry tags:

[hatch log] into the garbage chute, flyboy(s)

CHARACTERS: All
WHERE: The Station + Concordia
WHEN: DAY :43 - :44
SUMMARY: New hosts hatch on the Station; their arrival on Concordia is bumpier and smellier than usual.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary.

YOU WAKE UP and nothing will ever be the same again. A moment ago you were somewhere familiar - or familiar enough; now you're lying in a small faintly hexagonal chamber lit by a gentle white light emanating from the surrounding walls. You can't shake the sensation that you've been asleep for a long, long time.

The sluggishness of coming out of a deep, dreamless sleep persists all the way until you disconnect the tube running from the compartment's rear wall to the base of your neck. Then 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. Somewhere, someone else is feeding their thoughts and emotions into your mind. On the plus side, it's easy to follow that digging, familiar sensation to each other. After all, you're part of the same brood. You belong together.

Welcome to Station 72. Sirius and Kavinsky will have one day aboard the Station to acclimate to their new reality before they're whisked away to Concordia to join the rest of the young hosts. Get to know one another, ask some burning questions; in a day's time you'll be boarding a shuttle and going somewhere far, far away.

MEANWHILE IN CONCORDIA, the host's espionage efforts are coming to a head. Preparations for infiltrating Public Security HQ are in full swing, a handful of hosts are planning to get in close with Representative Goram Saffit himself and there's currently a semi-functional android taking up one of the beds of the Bearings apartment block. Honestly, there's more than enough on everyone's plate without piling new hosts on top of it all. But that doesn't stop Nirad from disappearing when he's called to return to the Station. Presumably, this means everyone better get ready to debrief some new arrivals soon...

     ON THE STATION, there's a hum in the air - or the mind, rather. Follow the buzz and it'll lead to the Hangar Deck where a slick brick-shaped black transport is waiting. The source of the mental hum seems to be a young man: Nirad has come to collect you. He'll answer any questions; in fact, he seems happy to talk and length about absolutely anything. The boy's apparently the rambling type with little to no filter between his brain and his mouth. The combination of talking and mental hum can be disorienting. Once safely aboard the transport, the ship’s landing platform descends through the floor of the hangar. It snaps into place in the airlock. For a moment there’s a beat of perfect stillness, a shiver of anticipation. Then the transport is flung through the shaft and 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.

     A BUMPY LANDING
The stealth ship slices down toward the planet until it fills the entire viewscreen. "All right, everyone out," Nirad announces, unbuckling his harness and jumping to his feet. Uh. What?

He leads to the port side of the transport ship where there's a small series of circular ports. They're roughly shoulder width. At a touch of a button, the ports open out to a series of escape pods. There's only enough room for one and it looks like you'll be lying on your back the whole trip. "Hop in. I'll launch you and then follow you down in my own. The pod's stealth tech should keep you invisible to the locals until someone comes to find it, but don't forget to scrap the pod when you're out of it. We can't risk someone finding it laying around." A pause. "Sorry, by the way. Usually we'd just land the ship but it's getting kind of obvious."

Hopefully you weren't expecting a nice, easy trip down to the planet because this is dark and joyless. The escape pod has no windows. It launches from the transport ship and rockets downward at the behest of the planet's gravity. Everything shakes. It's desperately cold, then violently hot and then-- something gives. The sound of something whistling. A jerk. The escape pod trembles as the anti-grav jets at the base deploy. It's a last attempt to soften the landing, then the pod drives down into a mountain of debris like a tent stake into muddy earth.

Congratulations, you've landed more or less safely in Concordia's only open air landfill.

     SEARCH & RESCUE
It's three in the morning and maybe you're asleep in Bearings or maybe you're burning the midnight oil; either way, Carata is in your mind telling you to get up and get ready. "The new hosts have landed. Let's go pick them up, shall we? If I were were, I'd wear some clothes you don't really care for."

Time to go digging through the city's biggest ~~dumpster~~ transfer facility!

The escape pods will have to be unearthed and opened from the outside to rescue their inhabitants. Once free, be sure to dismantle pods and scatter them through the piles of debris. Eventually all of this will be recycled, but we don't want anyone finding mysterious alien technology in one piece now do we?

((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 )

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ "Let's go pick them up." That had been confusing, in the three-in-the-morning haze of dreams that were sure a lot better than whatever was happening now. None of them had gone along on any of the previous pickup runs, after all, so why would they take anyone now? It was just back at the station, right?

But then everything starts to make sense. Horrible, smelly, are-you-kidding-me sense.

Oh, boy.

It's not hard to zero in on the newcomers, at least, because going to a dumpster at stupid in the morning is bad enough without having to spend a couple hours trying to actually find wherever they crashed, and there's an irate bout of existential angst - no, maybe more like just existential annoyance - going in Sam's head when he starts digging his way through. Blowing all of this stuff up would be easier, but he figures that using his powers is likely to draw attention he doesn't want on him, so...getting friendly with the garbage it is. Ugh.

But there's a sense of relief when he finally pops the hatch, and -

- gun? Huh. ]

Dude. You guys really took the low road to get here.

[Gun. Gun pointing at kid, little younger than Kavinsky if the shape of his face has any story to tell. The kid doesn't read as dangerous, not in the serpentine, sharp-angled way that Kavinsky does, so that means he's not a threat. Not a kindred soul, either, but they're tied together by that invisible cord that spreads out into a tapestry of too much and not enough.

He kinda sorta misses Sirius and also thinks the break from the intensity of Them is nice.

As long as it's only a break.

The gun dips down. With only mild grumbling from his knee, he wrenches himself up until he's sitting.

The gun's stuck into the back of his pants like he's an action star or a guy that really isn't scared of blowing a second hole in his ass.]

Flying coach keeps me humble, man. I forgot it always smells like a sewer.

[ He doesn't bat an eyelash when the gun gets pointed at him - maybe it's potentially misplaced trust that this guy isn't going to blow his head off for no good reason, maybe it's because he's pretty sure that even if he did, it would hurt less than some fights he's gotten into.

(And he knows approximately jack about the coach experience firsthand, since the only plane he's flown in is the Quinjet, but he's heard enough jokes about it to get the idea.)

That looks like a really bad place to put a gun, but okay, your ass, bro? ]

The good news is, there's a shower on the other end.

[ He offers a hand to help him out. Sam's pretty short, though. Try not to pull him in instead. ]

Once we take care of this thing, I mean.

[He used to keep the gun in his dashboard, sometimes under it, sometimes tucked beneath his thigh as he settled back into the driver's seat. Kavinsky didn't obtain this gun legally, or even under any typical illegal method; he has that bad habit. All his favorite things come from a source they shouldn't.

Kavinsky takes the hand, and because he's hated waiting around in the pod for so long, he doesn't jerk Sam down into a compromising position. The fun of starting a tussle wouldn't be nearly as good as making a strong ally and getting out of the coffin.

Can the other boy feel that? How cramped the box was? How much Kavinsky hated it? How he's been dying for company?

With care, he steps out of the pod, then wrinkles his nose. The smell hasn't gotten any better.]

They sent us down to a fucking garbage heap.

[Speaking of garbage heaps:]

There should be another pod.

[ He can definitely feel it. Sam's not as good at most of the others at tuning out the things he doesn't want to be feeling from others, and he's even worse at turning his own mental volume down instead of projecting too much, too often. And it's easier when it's all familiar - the frustration of arriving and just getting thrown into this sideshow. The loneliness - well, that was a problem way before he ever got here, anyway.

But even if he's not good at shutting things out, he's getting better at just moving on without bringing it up. ]

First time they've done it this way. I guess you guys are the lucky ones.

[ Another pod doesn't surprise him; it seems like everyone's hatched in pairs or more. (Well. Everyone except him. But doesn't that sound about par for how his life's been, anyway?) Finding it shouldn't be too bad, but digging it out is going to be the part that sucks. ]

Only one more?

Yeah. One more.

[Somewhere in the junkyard, Sirius yet breathes, and that's enough to set Kavinsky at ease. Their relationship hasn't been smooth sailing or anything in the same realm, but now that a part of himself has been carved out for the man, he wants to know where he's at. Anything beyond that hasn't been determined. They have time. They're saving the universe, after all.

Kavinsky tilts his head as far back as it wants to go, staring at an alien sky.

Either this is all real or he's finally overdosed and the last few hours crawl out as days.]

Let's let him wait a while.

[ Sam blinks. Letting him wait seems...kind of counter-intuitive, really, since as long as he's in there, they're all feeling the repercussions. ]

What, did he kick your puppy on the station or something?

[ Still, there are a lot of them out here. More than likely someone else will find him soon enough regardless of what they do or don't do. ]

[Did he kick the puppy? No. He resembles one, given the puppy grew another ten years into a grizzled, world-wary mutt with sunken eyes and a bad temper. A dog that doesn't have foam on its muzzle, but that's about the only saving grace. He is protective of him, of course, since there is no choice but to be. Kavinsky could find him in a matter of minutes, he thinks, even if he were halfway across the landfill and buried under three hundred rotting mattresses. Such is their connection.

But he wasn't racing off to dig him free as a matter of principle. Sirius should stop forcing a gap between them. He should grow to miss him.

After everything with Ronan, Kavinsky is willing to try several new approaches. (Though he did nothing wrong.)]

Cut its throat. The bitch never saw it coming.

[ Sigh. Everyone's a comedian.

But Sam doesn't press the point, since someone else might well already be digging him out. There are a bunch of them here. And maybe this guy could just use a breather after rejoining the normal world himself. ]

Did they give you guys much time on the station, or just ship you straight down?

They kept us about a day.

[The whole time, Kavinsky was shaking, scratching, tapping his feet, wanting to be where the people are. He dogged Sirius' steps, wandering off on his own only enough to keep up the appearance of not hating the Venn diagram middle of loneliness and sobriety. Even his dream version of Prokopenko would've made better company than the empty halls while the niggling knowledge of there are more elsewhere kept chewing at the grey matter of his brain.

He doesn't mind his rescuer sighing at his jokes, frowning at his flippancy. It's someone.]

Were you expecting something else?

Nah, that sounds about normal.

[ He shrugs. ]

I got like ten minutes before they politely suggested I get moving, but as far as I know, I'm the only one who woke up alone? So maybe that had something to do with it.

[So many comments to make and such little time; waking up alone is such a sad thing. Kavinsky doesn't usually wake up alone. He wakes up in a tangle of sluggish bodies, forehead throbbing until he finds the hair of the dog he needs to get by. When he is alone, it's quite on purpose so that he can wake up with the dream item he needs without too much questions getting asked.]

We can work on that.

[He doesn't clarify.]

Where's your car?

[ It's a weird way to put it. Work on it?

But okay, whatever. First things first. ]

Carata drove.

[ He doesn't even have a learner's permit yet. ]

Who's a Carata?

[Kavinsky could care less about the driver than the vehicle itself, but he's figured out the name of the game. He has to learn to fit in before he takes the wheel himself. Learn names, learn leaders, learn divides. A better education than Aliongby ever offered him.]

She got here first. Her and Nirad. The rest of us got sent along later...to help them out, I guess.

[ Though really, it's not like they're following Carata and Nirad's lead so much as they're just kind of throwing themselves at everything and hoping they're going in the right direction, and sometimes the other two have input for them. ]

[Sometimes very close to the wire, as in Kavinsky's case, where he's shown up in the final hour with little more to do than offer support.

Or break the pod, as he's now aiming to do. There's plenty of makeshift weapons within the junk; pipes and rusted hunks of metal that could scrape at the capsule's better make. He picks up a piece with a rather sharp edge and starts to wedge it into one of the pod's few seams.]

What do you do, man? How do you bring home the bacon?

There's something throwing a wrench in the technological progress here, apparently? And we're supposed to make sure things keep going.

[ Breaking up the pod. Right, can't let the locals find it.

Blowing it up would probably attract more attention than they want, and especially with the plans to break into Public Security almost in motion, Sam's not about to risk anything that might give away anything about the Nova Force. If it's on scanners or it's been seen or anything, people are going to ask all the wrong questions when he busts it out to be their distraction.

So he grabs a pipe instead and moves to the opposite end of the pod, where he's not going to risk smashing Kavinsky's fingers. ]

But then there were a couple of bombings, and I think most of us are more invested in making sure that doesn't happen again.

[Kavinsky welcomes the new and exciting along with something that feels ultimately familiar and primal; him and someone he's convinced to join him wrecking an item once beautiful and functional. Back to the classics. The basics of his craft. He has no idea of how the pod is put together, so he's making a guess of figuring out weakpoints. The other boy may have a better idea of the mechanics.]

Bombs.

[Delightful.]

I can help with that.

[The wrong kind of help. He grins.]

[ Sam does have a pretty good idea; he spends enough time in space, so after eyeing his end for a moment and guessing about where the CPU ought to be, he aims his first swing for that spot.

It does feel kind of good, to just hit something. Throwing around gravimetric energy and all the superhero stuff is one thing, but firing at range doesn't have the same sense of catharsis that hitting stuff does. And given that he hasn't been able to just take off to space for a few hours whenever he needs to find his center, because of all this low profile stuff -

- well, that next swing comes with all the force of someone who's got a few things to work out behind it. ]

You know about that kind of stuff?

[ He's not sure any of them are exactly demolitions experts, when he thinks about it.

Then again, he wouldn't have guessed Bruce was some kind of Wall Street ninja from the first things he'd seen of him, so really, who knows what this excuse for a team is capable of. ]

Yeah.

[The yeah is heavy, weighted with the memory of homebrew bombs, the sort that people put up instructions for on the internet that aren't seen as bad enough to get taken down. There's Molotovas; simply by design but still terrifically lethal. Add in fireworks, add in pipebombs and cherry bombs. Add in bombs he could dream up with all sorts of unique methods of exploding; they could carry gas, they could carry nails. They could carry nail-bats.

Kavinsky's pausing to watch the boy with the sweet face and the steady voice punch the pod like it owes him money and made a mom joke when it came time to pay up. He doesn't mind that. That's the first part of this kid that's looked usable.]

Do you know what the wrench thing is?

The what?

[ It takes him a second, before he remembers he said that. ]

Oh! Right. So they're really close to getting AI pretty much on even footing with people. But the opposition's gotten weirdly louder, so we figure someone's giving them a push to try and stop it. Maybe through the hacker groups, maybe through political stuff...we're kinda chasing down both.

[This sounds an awful lot like the plot to a sci-fi movie Kavinsky put on once when he was too wasted for his own thoughts to be the only sound rattling around his skull. He would have vomited, or worse, ceased to be any fun.

Only in that flick, he's fairly sure the good guy was against the robot uprising, but maybe they aren't really the good guys. Happens.]

I can do some cat and mouse.

You're gonna be ahead of some of us, then. We've got...all types.

[ People who can fight, people who can't fight. People who don't know how to handle this spy stuff, people who apparently have successful amateur careers in breaking and entering.

Knowing how to do just about anything seems like it'll come in handy sooner or later. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[hatch log] into the garbage chute, flyboy(s)

1, because making him climb out of that pod a third time makes me laugh

pod me baby one more time

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