station72 | [mission: hyrypia] i am not there; i do not sleep

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[mission: hyrypia] i am not there; i do not sleep

CHARACTERS: New Hosts & EVERYONE
WHERE: Station 72; Hyrypia - The Graze
WHEN: DAY :019 - DAY :020
SUMMARY: Somewhere deep in the void between multiverses, a fresh clutch of Hosts hatches; down on the planet Hyrypia, a Host is laid to rest.
WARNINGS: Mentions of character death, funerary services. Will update as necessary. Need a warning added? PM this account please!

STATION 72
DAY :019

NEW HATCHES
YOU WAKE UP and the universe with you in it is suddenly different. --No. That's not right. You're you, the universe is as it's always been, 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 coming up from the darkness of some wine dark sea. Nothing is different and yet everything is.

Here you are, a small miracle of the multiverse: lying in a small, faintly hexagonal chamber with 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 calmed. There's something peaceful about waking up here - like you belong. 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. A matching dread. An easy comfort. 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 nearby 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. There are a handful of you here, somehow intimately familiar to each other.

Welcome to Station 72. Beyond this room it's quiet and still, feeling for all the world like a shell for some vast dark thing.

Eventually, a sensation manifests out of the black. It says:

PREPARE YOURSELF
THE VOICE IN YOUR HEAD is sound and sensation: a warm shaft of sunlight through smoky glass - a gauzy curtain twitching in some summer breeze. It says or feels like:

( Come meet with me, won't you? )

Where exactly this meeting is supposed to occur isn't immediately clear, but head in the direction that seems correct and eventually Station 72 gets you where you're meant to be: a circular briefing room with tiered seating, empty now, before a woman with a sheet of graying hair and something focused in her expression. It's been some time since she's spoken with a young host - since she's done one of this briefings. Apparently she's feeling something like her usual self. She smiles and it's very warm.

"Welcome to Station 72. Unfortunately, you won't be here long but we'd like to answer as many of your questions as we're able before you leave this place."

[ooc note: please see here for the catch-all briefing thread]

THE STATION
WITH A LITTLE UNDER 24 HOURS before it's time to make the trip to Hyrypia, this is as good an opportunity as you're going to get to familiarize yourself with Station 72 before you leave it. There's plenty to see, but a distinct lack of people to make conversation with. It's lonely and quiet and there's a sensation of dust gathering even where there is none. Maybe studying the briefing files on your databank is the most proactive distraction, but if not? Well there's plenty of places to get lost...

In the simulated morning, a strange archaic ship has arrived on the Hangar. Its very alien pilots unload two heavy trunks, then dole out a series of kits to the new hosts. One of them - the pale female alien who her calls herself Rhan - cheerfully announces, "Get changes and buckle in. I'm afraid we've some grim business ahead of us today. Funerals, you know. But chin up, my darlings. One uncomfortable day and then we'll leave the matter behind us. --Oh, but do be gentle with the others. I suspect they might be tender for a few days yet."

You leave the Station. If you're lucky, you might one day make it back.

HYRYPIA - THE GRAZE
DAY :020

THE FUNERAL PROCESSION
A SHIP DESCENDS from the iron colored sky early in the morning on Day :020. Before it even pierces the planet's atmosphere, its cargo should be obvious to the other Carbauschians: a new batch of Hosts, freshly hatched and just in time for the grim festivities.

The idea is simple: that they are part of a mourning delegation, only here to briefly oversee Lavellan's funerary rites. Luckily (...) there's plenty of comatose Hosts lying in the tents to trade places with the newcomers.

Better get to know your new friends quickly - there's plenty to be brought up to speed on (such as, uh, the recent death of one of the elder Hosts), and likely enough work to be done that the new spare hands are welcome. Or maybe the state of nothing-like-faux mourning is a good excuse for some alone time on a strange new alien planet. You're all so very, very far from home.

BURIAL RITES
THE FUNERAL has been arranged to the Hosts' precise specifications. Each and every single request they've made has been met, carried out by two soft-spoken, contrite Hyrypian servants who had come to them not long after their return from the hunt. Perhaps because the members of the other envoys are unsure whether it's permitted or welcome to attend, the site of the funerary pyre is hardly full to bursting with onlookers. Or maybe the burning of corpses goes against some obscure tradition. Or maybe some of the minor envoys simply don't care much and think the Carbasuchians are best left to their grief alone. Still, while it's hardly the entire encampment in attendance a notable selection of diplomats and their respective entourages and several of their Hyrypian hosts have turned out for the ceremony. It seems the Descendants in particular have turned out in some force, including the very hunter saved by Lavellan's quick thinking.

When the time comes for the rites to proceed, it's left to the Hosts to light the fire and say their farewells to their fallen comrade - the first and hopefully last to be lost in this strange land.

A SOMBER CELEBRATION
ASH SCENT HANGS HEAVY STILL over the encampment. Or maybe that's simply the perception - after all, the breeze still blows in from over the Great Flat. Surely it's just a memory of the smell which lingers, as circumstantial as the mournful note the wind sighs as it cuts across the Graze and into the tangled Finger Maze.

However, matters of the universe don't pause for the tragedy of the loss of an envoy - and there is so much riding on this Pilgrimage. To their credit, the Hyrypians have done all they can to provide for the Carbauschians in their time of grief (including a visit from the Matron Bassita herself, pale and full of sympathy and apologies), and as evening falls what clearly was meant to be a carousing party to celebrate a successful hunt and completion of the Pilgrimage's first stage has been considerably tempered.

The drinks still flow; the food is still plentiful, rich and lavishly spiced - but the music being played is soft and careful and of the hundreds of small technomanced insect lights the drift over the encampment tonight, a considerably portion of them are dedicated to lingering around the charred skeleton of the funeral pyre as a sober acknowledgement of what has come to pass.

Give it a few hours and maybe the mood will lighten slightly. On the other hand, there's nothing like an uncomfortably close tragedy to bring people together - and as Rhan suggests, maybe now's exactly the right time to ask a few pointed questions. Or to get hammered with new friends. Or to take a nice long walk while everyone else is consumed by the muted festivities.

((OOC Notes: This log covers the hatch, the arrival of new Hosts on Hyrypia, the funeral of Lavellan and the supremely awkward dinner party meant to wrap the first stage of the Pilgrimage. Feel free to make your own logs and posts additional to this if you care to. You can find a more detailed overview of the host hatching process HERE and additional setting information about the Station HERE. Please be sure to review the MISSION: HYRYPIA ooc information if you're brand new to the game. If you have any questions, please hit up either the mission's question thread, the FAQ or MOD CONTACT pages!))

NAVIGATION • GAME CALENDAR • MISSION: HYRYPIA • FAQ • MOD CONTACT • GLOSSARY

( CODE BY WHAMBAM )

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[ Another funeral. How many is that now, just from the past year? Too many, really. There's a relief that at least she didn't know this person, and she feels terrible for thinking that way when so many of the Nest are grieving his loss. Her own grief threatens to rise to the surface throughout the service, but she does her best to keep it tucked away, instead focusing on the others.

After Shiro moves to set something by the body, Elena finally steps forward, walking through the small crowd to stand by his side. She doesn't say anything at first, just slips her arm through his, the one she'd helped to heal just days earlier. With everything that's happened, it feels like it's been a lifetime since then. ]

[It isn't anything she's done or said or anything like that. But he doesn't look at her, as she steps beside him. Elena has done nothing wrong. Looking at her, at anyone, now, feels like a disservice to the person they're leaving behind. A disservice to his friend.]

[To one more person (one fewer person) who understood.]

[His arm aches. Old phantom pains and echos of green light where there should be purple flickers. Elena's hand slides through his other arm, and he finds himself gripping onto her hand. Tightly.]

(... are you okay?)

[ It doesn't bother her in the slightest that he doesn't look at her. People handle grief in different ways, and she's certainly no one to judge him for what he's feeling, or what he feels he needs to do. If it helps ease the pain in his soul to stand vigil like this, then she'll simply stand with him for as long as he'll let her. ]

( I didn't know him. I feel guilty for being grateful for that. )

[ She's just lost so many people. The thought of losing one more... Leaning in against his arm, her free hand wrapping around his elbow. Holding on, for both their sakes. ]

(Don't be.)

[Don't feel guilty. Don't beat yourself up over it. It's better that some of them don't know. That some of them don't hurt like this. Don't feel like part of themselves have been ripped apart, shredded and cut open under hot lights and held down and pieces pulled out, the people they're supposed to trust betraying that trust betraying them and don't put me under don't please listen--]

[He shakes his head. Human hand tightening on hers reflexively.]

(I'm sorry. It's -- it's bad.)

[ She keeps a firm hold on him, giving a gentle squeeze to his elbow, practically hugging him at this point while she pushes gentle reassurance toward him. ]

( It's okay, Shiro. I... know grief. Really well. You don't need to worry about me when it comes to this, and you don't need to go through this alone. )

[ She doesn't mean just herself, of course. There are other people here who care about him, lots of them who will offer comfort and support if he lets them. Whether he will or not is the question. ]

[He wishes he could say it was nice. But all he can think of is "it's grounding". Her hold, the pressure of her hands and arms keeping his mind centered on this reality. Pulling him back from the memory of coming back to Earth. The Garrison -- the people he'd gone to for help turning him into a science project.]

[Like people here had done to Lavellan.]

(Sam... probably would tell you -- worrying about other people helps.)

[It helps him. It keeps his mind focused on something. Instead of drifting away to where it wants to go.]

[ He doesn't need to say it for Elena to understand. Sometimes what you need is a reminder of what you have, of what's still left for you in this life without that person, what gives you reason to keep moving forward away from those dark memories of the past. It's how she's survived the past year. ]

( He'd be right. It's what I've been doing all day. )

[ It helps. It doesn't fix everything, but it helps. ]

(Yeah. Me too.)

[It's what he always does. What's always been easier. Worry about everyone and everything else. Worry about Sam, about Bucky. About Pidge and Lavellan...]

[Lavellan can't be helped any longer.]

[He leans into Elena a little more. Fighting back the shudder.]

(We... we had some things in common.)

[ They're so alike, Elena and Shiro. Sometimes it hits her out of nowhere, how the broken pieces of their past have shaped them into people who have to struggle just to survive the day, let alone the night. He doesn't deserve this pain, and she desperately wishes she could shoulder it for him; it's nothing she hasn't known before. ]

( Then I'm sorry I didn't have the chance to know him. )

(I thought... he was someone else, when I met him.)

[It really is better she never met him. Better she doesn't have to go through this. Better she doesn't have this open wound in her head. The arching lightning sick and slick where it's usually bright. Like an infection.]

[He tries for wry humor in that statement. But it doesn't come out right.]

(If anything -- if any of this is getting out --) [He pauses, inclining his head to mean the storm of his thoughts.] (I'm sorry.)

[ It is, a little, just hints of the turmoil raging inside him, flashes of the pain he's in. Perhaps it's because they've been so close, embracing their connection and each other, but she doesn't mind it. No, it's not the most pleasant bleedover she's experienced in the Nest so far, but she's not going to fault him for what he's going through. ]

( It's okay, Shiro. I'm made of tough stuff, I can handle it. )

[ She's been through a lot worse than this and still come out the other side. If supporting him now means she has to deal with that storm in his mind, then that's what she'll do. ]

[Keeping his brain on lockdown is easier said than done right now. Easier to do in theory. In times when you're not struggling, suffering, and refusing crack. Because you can't.]

(I know. I know you are.)

[But others might not be. And for them, it has to stay silent.]

[ He's like her, feeling as if he always has to be the strong one, the person keeping it together and never letting anyone see just how hard that is to manage. Never asking for help even when they need it, and having a difficult time accepting it when it's offered. It hurts a little, to see so much of herself in him, but at the same time it's helping her to understand what he needs and how she might be able to give that to him. ]

( You're not going to hurt anyone here, and you're going to get through this. I promise. )

(I could.)

[That's the problem. The option is there. The potential is there. As much as he would never, consciously try to. It's always there. As long as this thing is in his head, this weight is attached to his shoulder, it could happen.]

(It could happen.)

[Like she'd always feared. Like he's felt from her. They're so much alike in this... he doesn't know what to do with himself.]

[ Pulling in a deep breath, Elena leans in just that little bit closer to press her cheek to Shiro's shoulder. She doesn't care what anyone in the crowd might interpret this as, she just wants to be as close and comforting to her friend as she can be. ]

( Then maybe we should help each other. Promise to stop each other if the worst happens. )

[ Because she needs that. She knows that Damon would stop her, to an extent, but that her safety and well-being will always be what he puts before anything and anyone else. So she needs to have someone in her corner who will do whatever it takes to keep her from hurting others unintentionally. ]

[It's fine. No one needs to worry about what these people think. He doesn't. Not here. Not with these strangers. He's grateful for her support. Just... wishing he could let her know in more detail.]

[He'll have to settle for squeezing her hand.]

(I promise.)

[Said with the same, bone deep sincerity he'd promise anyone else. If she needs him, he'll be there. She couldn't hurt him -- not with the arm. If she needed it, he would be there for her.]

(I'll keep you safe.)

[ Details aren't needed, and neither is his thanks. This is what she does, who she is. The day she stops supporting the people she loves is the day she becomes Katherine Pierce, and she will fight tooth and nail to never let that happen. ]

( I promise too. I'll be here for you no matter what. )

[ The only thing that might stop her is falling into a coma, like the other her, the one back on the station. It's an unsettling thing to think about, so she tries hard not to. ]

(Look at us. I ... feel like I should be kneeling for this.)

[It's meant to be a little funny. Just a little. Some bit of black humor. Just to try it. To make her laugh, even slightly.]

[It would be worth it.]

[ It works. There's a very quiet chuckle from Elena, the sense of a small laugh and a flutter of amusement through their bond, and she gives a gentle nudge to his side. It's sweet of him to make that sort of effort when he's going through this kind of pain. ]

( Well, you are taller than me. )

[It's ridiculous. There's nothing about the gesture that's going to do them any good. Why should he do it? But by the same token, her amusement is good enough. Enough of a motivation. So his weight shifts.]

[And he kneels.]

(I'll keep an eye on you. Ma'am.)

[ It is ridiculous, and she adores him for it. Chuckling a little more, she sets a hand on his shoulder in both support and gratitude. ]

( Are you my white knight now? Sir Shiro? )

[ For some, making jokes like this at a funeral might be considered appalling. For Elena? She's been to enough funerals to no longer care. Funerals aren't for the dead, they're for the living to cope with grief and loss, and this is what they need right now. ]

(Not white.)

[Despite the nickname, despite what it could be read as, according to Allura, white isn't his color.]

(Black Paladin.)

[First time it's come up, in conversation with Elena. But here, playing at swearing an oath to her, trying to take their minds off the nagging, pounding loss in the back of his head, she might not think much of it.]

[ Black Paladin. She doesn't understand what it means, but she realizes there's a weight to the title, an importance to it. For him, but also just in general. That's why she asks. ]

( What does it mean, to be a Black Paladin? )

[He quiets for a moment. Fighting against the storm and the lightning in his skull. Settling on a memory of steady recitation. Of Allura's assured voice in a field of stars.]

(The leader of the team.)

[Their faces flickering in sudden, bright pinpoints. The three boys - blue, yellow, red. Pidge in vibrant, living green. Good memories. Fond memories.]

(The head of the others. Always steady - always in control.)

[The last three words are Allura's. Her voice echoing through his own. The irony of it. The one who should be in control of himself, has the ability to lose it all, while he's here.]

[ That's such a heavy weight to bear, for anyone not just Shiro. It's easy to see why he's so hard on himself when it comes to having control and the possibility of losing it. ]

( You're not the leader here, Shiro. You're not responsible for everyone, we're all in this together. It's okay to let go a little. )

[ As strong as he's always had to be for his team, for Pidge and the others she can feel his affection for, he doesn't always have to be that strong. He can let someone else carry that burden for a little while.

Not that she's very good at practicing what she preaches, of course. ]

[mission: hyrypia] i am not there; i do not sleep

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