twenty-eighth jump;

[ataraxites]

CHARACTERS: Any and all.
LOCATION: Gravity Couches and beyond.
WARNINGS: Maybe some swearing, or even some violence, and more than likely some implied (and possibly explicit) nakedness.
SUMMARY: Another month, another jump, another round of new faces.
NOTES: It could just be the standard sensation of air on wet skin, but if you bother to check, you might notice the steam rising from your body, barely there and gone within a minute. By the time you get to the showers, it will be clear that it's not just taking you time to adjust. The room is cold — colder than usual, but no worse than the last jump. While it's nothing dangerous, it's certainly motivation to hurry through the usual routine and get dressed quickly.



It's getting closer.




YOUR EYES ARE OPEN.

KEEP LOOKING.

You wake up in darkness.

There's a breathing tube jammed down your trachea, and you're suspended in a tube of clear blue fluid. Upon registering your level of consciousness, the gravity couch drains the fluid surrounding you and retracts the breathing apparatus; the doors in front of you open, and you're deposited on the floor of a stark, sterile medical bay.

You are not alone.
There are others who have come before you, others who are awakening beside you. Some may be familiar to you, perhaps even friends. Others have much less amiable plans. Some are merely alien and inexplicable, but there are always those who might mean you harm.

After you catch your breath and your vision returns, you notice a number on the inside of your forearm. Maybe it's a familiar number. Maybe it means something. Maybe it's just a number. But the number—completely unique to you—is a tattoo, and it does not come off.

If you enter the room adjacent to the medbay, you will find a small locker with your number on it, surrounded by rows upon rows of identical lockers. Inside, you will find a few of your personal items, a communications device, and a ship's uniform in your exact size. The comms device is fully powered and connects directly to the ship's network; it's your only means of communication beyond physical conversation. Upon turning the device on, a neutral, automated voice will say, "Please take the blue lift to the passenger quarters." Any other attempts at communicating with the rest of the network are met only with static.

This is your welcome party.

Comments

[cargojet]

[ Christ, but his face hurts. It's good to surprise the other man, though, get a shot in all of his own, even if he still hasn't quite worked out quite who swung at him. He'd heard a voice, seen a face, but all there had been in his head was ringing after that. Now that Erik finds his feet, Nathan identifies him, and the attack suddenly makes a whole lot more sense.

Of course. You don't just go and almost kill Charles Xavier without getting a shattered jawbone for your effort.

He rakes his hand back through his hair, brings his fists up again, broad shouldered but with a relatively open stance. He's not a trained fighter, just a bruiser (and the occasional bully). Petrellis fight with heart, not skill. ]

You got a good right hook, but in the future maybe leave the flying to me, huh?

[sorrycharles]

[ It takes too long for Erik to come around to focus. He’s still nursing a concussion from the blow that blacked his eye just prior to the jump, unsteady in a sway at his shoulders when he stands up straight. Nathan is flying.

That explains -- a lot.

Thicker blood runs at a stop and start from the base of his nose while he struggles to force his lungs open all the way. They’re tangled like parachutes, catching only so much air despite the way he’s gasping. A scrape at his knee has set to bleeding as well -- the water around him is mottled off-color by the runoff.

One look at Petrelli’s form keeps him from raising his fists in mirror. He scoffs instead.

The effect is somewhat lessened by the bruising, the blood gumming his beard, the trouble he’s having balancing.

So it goes. ]

Provided, [ he says, with only so much space for words between breaths, ] that the next time you have a death wish, [ his grimace peels into a grin: ] you leave it to me.

[cargojet]

[ When Erik doesn't come flying back at him, Nathan lowers one of his arms, allowing the other to reach up and nurse the bruises forming on his own face. Getting punched once by Spike two months ago was one thing, but getting attacked again? It's getting old. Really old. That's why this time he chose to defend himself. Why he'll defend himself again. He's been the quiet, obedient Senator for much too long. He's let people on this ship think he's soft, let them think he doesn't have teeth and fists of his own. Well no more.

His feet touch the ground gently, is hand moving away from his stinging face. ]

And let you get out of this place before I do? I don't think so.

[ He takes a deep breath, then lets it out all at once, shaking his head. ]

You actually feel any better, or did you just add actual bruises to the metaphysical ones?

[sorrycharles]

[ Erik looks like a street dog fresh out of a fight: rattled, scruffy and desperate. There’s nothing noble about the way he shivers with adrenaline, or in the way he eyes Nathan setting down across from him, like he’s struggling not to lunge after him a second time.

At a distance, Lehnsherr’s too lean without his clothes, all bloody runoff and short breaths. ]

What about you? [ he wants to know. ]

Are you convinced of your own ineptitude or can we expect another call to arms next month?

[cargojet]

[ Nathan has looked better too. Too many days on the bridge, not eating for what felt like years, a hollowness to his tired eyes and a gauntness to his frame, a half inch of beard already grown and unruly. He's all body hair and shoulders regardless of that, though, unabashed masculinity despite his diminutive height. ]

I haven't decided yet. If the situation warrants a call to arms I intend to call it.

But my actions weren't ineptitude. I'm no fool. The only people who are going to be dogged enough to stick to that line of thinking aren't capable of seeing the bigger picture.

Which one are you going to be, Lehnsherr? Let me guess, the one who thinks the only missions you can learn from are the ones that are glowing successes, error free? World doesn't work like that.