[hatch log] everything happens so much

[onemind]

CHARACTERS: New Hosts & EVERYONE
WHERE: The Station
WHEN: DAY :039
SUMMARY: New faces and old losses - a hatch occurs and a number of older hosts go comatose. Coma'd hosts include all auto-piloted dropped characters to date.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary. Need a warning added? PM this account please!

NEW HATCHES
YOU WAKE UP and suddenly you're a different person. No. That's not right. You're you and there's no suddenly about it. It's been a while, hasn't it? It feels like waking up from a very deep, extended sleep or like surfacing up from the darkness of the ocean and right there in your own head there's something both familiar and strange. You know intuitively that you've been unconscious for more than just a blink of the eye. While it’s impossible to tell exactly how long ago or how exactly you escaped the danger that had been breathing down your neck, you're certain it was more than a moment ago.

But here you are, a small miracle of the multiverse: lying in a small faintly hexagonal chamber, a gentle white light emanating from the surrounding walls. If you were injured during your escape, those injuries have been healed. If you were anxious or frightened or distraught, those feelings have been briefly calmed. There's something strangely peaceful about waking up here. That feeling persists even as you find the tube running from the base of your neck to the compartment's rear wall.

But once the tube's disconnected? Things get loud. A wave of emotion fills that peaceful 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 happening 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. Maybe it's time for a change? Drop down the ladder to the floor of the Nesting Deck and you’ll find you’re not alone. The closer you are to these stranger, the louder the sound in your head becomes. --Actually they're not quite strangers either, are they? Something is wound about and between you and these people, whoever they are, are as familiar as this place you've never been is.

Welcome to Station 72. The air buzzes with activity. Somewhere deep in the Station, other minds call to yours. They are bright, brilliantly celebratory spots in your subconscious. They are sun-warm gentle, or they are fire and the taste of ash, or they are a vibrant frenetic whirl, or they are a tangled garden, or they are the feeling of flight through dense cirrus clouds. No two links are exactly the same, but you know for certain that you are connected to all of them in at least some small way.

Which is why it's easy to tell when something goes terribly wrong:


OLD HOSTS
THE ENDORPHIN RUSH of making it back to Station 72 (relatively) unharmed, having successfully acquired exactly what you'd set out to get your hands on can't be denied. Even if you're not necessarily the type to celebrate, there's no ignoring the thrumming celebratory sensation from those Hosts who are.

After a few hours of being back in the void, something else stirs in the air: the clear, prickling sensation of new hosts hatching on the Nesting Deck. They're a rush of mental information - as if someone's turned the volume on the radio all the way up -, a cacophony of sensation and emotional feedback for anyone unprepared to shield against it.

The swell of feeling might make it easy to miss what follows immediately after: the dull, gut-deep quiet as The Darkling, Chuuya Nakahara, and Nasu Rei go suddenly comatose.

---

((OOC Notes: This is the hatch log for all new hosts. Feel free to make your own logs and posts additional to this if you care do. You can find a more detailed overview of the hatching process HERE. You can find additional setting information about the Station HERE If you have any questions, please hit up either the FAQ or MOD CONTACT pages!))

NAVIGATION • SETTING • FAQ • MOD CONTACT • GLOSSARY

( CODE BY WHAMBAM )

Comments

[wrackful]

[Moving again is better. Murphy would rather focus on that than think too much about how the world's hollowed out around him, or how Bellamy's hand in his is like the only source of light in a dead, flat darkness. But Bellamy doesn't give him that option, and his attempts to empathise only rile, draw frustration to the surface.]

I'm not a kid, Bellamy. [Derisive, sharp.] It's helping because you, for whatever twisted brain bug reason, feel real. Not because it gets me all warm and squishy inside.

[Though the chances of him admitting if he was taking comfort from physical contact with Bellamy were low.]

[deployed]

I'm not saying you're a kid.

[ Bellamy sounds irritated, and mildly ashamed of himself for being irritated. ]

I'm saying it helps.

[ And he's trying to make Murphy feel less alone in the overwhelming after effects of having used his powers. They round the last corner, and Bellamy tugs him down the hall towards his room. ]

Can you sleep this off, do you think?

[wrackful]

[He's right on that, at least, and Murphy doesn't bother argue it further - how he'd framed it, how he couldn't know what this was like. How it helped. They're almost at their rooms, but nearing the goal doesn't promise any kind of relief.]

No. [Only a beat of hesitation, and it's solid, certain.] I'm not trying that.

[It'd be great if he could. Just pass out for a while, wake up when it was done. But he doesn't want to know what it's like, having his eyes closed while he's feeling this.]

[deployed]

Alright.

[ Maybe Bellamy could have pushed it, but he senses the way Murphy rebels at the very idea and lets it go. It won't help. Bellamy doesn't need to debate it any further. ]

I can come in with you.

[ And stay until the aftereffects of his power pass. Bellamy wants to make it out like this is a choice, but he doesn't know how he'll be able to let go of Murphy even if Murphy asks him to. ]

[wrackful]

[The immediate objection rises again, that he isn't a kid, that he doesn't need babysitting. But if Bellamy doesn't come in with him then he's just going to be on his own in the room. It isn't going to matter that it's his room - he can tell that already, looking through the doorway at the scattering of belongings he hadn't taken down to Shril with him. Things that should be familiar, but still can't pierce the emptiness. A smaller space of nothing, but still nothing.]

Yeah. [He answers, irritated but resigned to this. That Bellamy's hand in his was his only option, right now.] Fine.

[deployed]

[ There's not very much in Murphy's room. Bellamy can't help but be a little surprised every time he sees how few things Murphy actually carried up from Concordia. He drops their packs against the wall as he leads Murphy to the bed. ]

I'll stay until it's over.

[ Bellamy doesn't leave room for argument. ]

Does it help when we talk?

[ Troubleshooting, even in the face of Murphy's annoyance, feels necessary. This will likely happen again. Bellamy wants to know how to make it easier for Murphy, even if Murphy begrudges him the proximity. ]

[wrackful]

[It's like a wound chafing. Bellamy's presence helps, but it also aggravates; distracts, but keeps bringing focus back. He can feel the frustration growing, building like an itch under his skin, enough that it doesn't matter how it doesn't fit with Bellamy sitting beside him on the bed, Bellamy holding his hand. He's still snapping before he can think about it:]

You know, I'd say yes, but the does it help questions are starting to piss me off, so maybe not.

[deployed]

[ Bellamy's eyes roll in response. The urge to snap back rises, obvious if Murphy cared to look, but he swallows it back. Murphy's frustration is palpable; the itch settles into Bellamy's skin secondhand. ]

Fine.

[ No more questions. Winging it at this point is haphazard enough to make Bellamy wary, but the alternate is just endlessly squabbling about his approach. It seems counterproductive. ]

Lean back. I'll tell you about the Minotaur.

[ Because of course Bellamy's going to pick a crusty old myth. ]

[wrackful]

[Murphy looks at him, immediately incredulous at that.]

You're kidding.

[deployed]

Do you have a better idea?

[ He wouldn't be surprised if Murphy suggested they just sit in silence. But a story would be better. It'd pass the time, and hopefully keep the pair of them from snapping each other while he recited it. It was the best option Bellamy felt they had at the moment. ]

[wrackful]

[He had had a better idea, back on Concordia. Cut the damn things out. But that plan had fallen through, landed them in jail, the window of opportunity swinging closed behind them as they left.

Bitterness swells, but it isn't enough to make him push away. It's heavy, instead, falling over him like a cloak, threaded through with resignation and fatigue. He looks at Bellamy flatly for another moment, then gives up, leaning away and back against the wall, their joined hands loose on the sheets between them.]

Fine. Whatever. Tell the stupid story.

[deployed]

[ Bellamy doesn't give Murphy any chance to go back on the invitation. He props himself against the wall, thumb rubbing over Murphy's knuckles as he begins to speak.

Part of him still hopes Murphy drifts off to sleep. It still strikes Bellamy as an easier way to ride out blowback than storytelling, but Murphy stays awake, and Bellamy talks his way through the entire debacle of Theseus and the Minotaur. The recitation drags up Octavia's face, young and eager while their mother sews at a table by the bed. Octavia has always been the only person Bellamy had told these stories to. They'd been her only means of escape. The memories tangle with the present, but it's not an unwelcome mingling. There's a pause after the inevitable unhappy ending, before Bellamy tugs lightly on Murphy's hand. ]

Is it passing?

[wrackful]

[Murphy doesn't sleep. He doesn't even risk closing his eyes, though the temptation is there as Bellamy tells the story. This is familiar, in part, from hearing him reading. The story plays out in Bellamy's head, in Murphy's own, and for a while it's enough to sink into that, focussed away from the emptiness rising and settling around him.

His frustration's cooled by the time Bellamy finishes, his tone less irritated as he answers. Resignation's taken its place, quiet and tired.]

No.

[He stares, absently, at their joined hands. Sometime during the telling, either he or Bellamy had slid against the wall, pressed together at the shoulder. He doesn't shift away. The contact is still an anchor.]

You were sick all day, at the prison.

[He doesn't say it, but the implication's there. What if this lasted the same amount of time?]

[deployed]

[ Time still goes blurry for him when he's sick. The fever and the fact that he's dropped off to sleep each time has made it hard to keep track. But Murphy's right. It may as well have been a day, considering how long it took Bellamy to be fully back on his feet. ]

You stayed with me.

[ It's a very simple statement, betraying how intimate it had felt for Murphy to be clutched that close in his mind. ]

I have more stories.

[ There's an offer couched there. Murphy's warm against his side, and Bellamy hasn't made a single move to pull away. And he won't, until what Murphy's feeling passes. ]

[wrackful]

[The immediate response is to point out that he hadn't had a choice. It had been just him and Bellamy in there, Bellamy's mind spilling feverish nightmares. He'd needed to hold on to try and calm him, to stick with his one ally in hostile territory.

And he'd wanted to be sure Bellamy was okay. He could try to deny that, but he knows, right now, it won't hold water. Just like trying to tell Bellamy not to waste hours with him won't, either

He exhales, slow, fingers shifting slightly against Bellamy's.]

Yeah, I know you do.

[Acceptance, settling in for whatever story Bellamy picks out next. But then:]

Thanks.

sticks bow on this

[deployed]

[ The gratitude is unexpected. Bellamy had thought it would go unspoken, much the way things had in the jail. He's quiet for a moment as Murphy gets comfortable. The tension had bled out of him as Bellamy had spoken, but it's absence feels weightier now. Bellamy rubs his thumb along Murphy's knuckles, humming in quiet acknowledgement as he casts about for another story.

As long as it takes, Bellamy had meant. They don't need to say anything more about it than that. It's how they've operated this far, him and Murphy. The scales balance. Bellamy drags up a knee, and starts telling Murphy about Perseus and the Gorgon Medusa, while they wait for this all to pass. ]