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

[pushfall]

"Not this. Definitely not this." Vague on purpose, but not hostile, though whether or not that's due in part to the raised hand is anyone's guess. For as bad as she's capable of feeling despite not actually being at fault, Claire has spent too long being too cautious and paranoid and terrified to just relent and offer up specifics to someone she doesn't even know. Not to mention, how the hell is she supposed to explain to someone that the last thing she was doing was hurtling herself off of a Ferris wheel on live TV?

"You know me?" Or you think you do, at least.

[allbloodyhail]

"I knew a you. This place is kinda..." There's a long pause, and he realizes there isn't really a more delicate way to put this: "I live with your uncle."

[pushfall]

"Strange?" she supplies within that pause, going with the only qualifier she can think of that adequately encompasses all of this insanity in one pocket definition. Of course, the majority of that strangeness is thrown out the window as one thought instantly amplifies.

Her face is swirling mixture of relief and trepidation, thrilled at the possibility of Peter actually being here and half-horrified that he's been here. She just saw him, moments ago, face dirty and turned up toward her. What will he think of her? She hadn't thought of that on the way down. All she can say now is: "Peter's here?"

The implications of this being his roommate are entirely lost on her in the face of wanting to see him immediately.

[allbloodyhail]

Oh, right, of course. Who cares about a fictional vampire when your family is in space with you!! Yeah, no, Spike isn't even offended. In fact, he's grateful to have the pressure taken off.

"Yeah, luv. He's here. He's been worried about you." And you know, so has Spike, but he's electing to leave off that part. She can find out Nathan is here all on her own; he usually tries to avoid even saying that guy's name. It makes him real or something.

sorry for slowness! work was cray this weekend

[pushfall]

In all honesty she would actually probably be way more interested in meeting and talking to a space vampire if he hadn't led with the fact that Peter was here. Knowing that there's a certain level of stability, something grounding in this outright impossibility, gives her cause to strive toward it. Not to mention her means of arrival have left her wanting to speak with him more than ever. Knowing that Peter has been here, though, when apparently she has also been here even though she doesn't remember it and is pretty sure she would remember something like this -

If her head could hurt, it would be throbbing by now.

Worrying Peter and everyone else is something that she's used to, however. The rate at which she throws herself into the fray and her ability to repair her own skin and bones notwithstanding, everyone has always wasted too much time worrying about her. "Do you know where I can find him?" she asks, looking up into this strange person's face and wishing that she could summon some amount of consideration that wasn't solely based on feeling guilty that she has no working memory of him. Claire knows what that's like, being faced with a gap in someone else's memory that you can't explain or do anything about.

no problem honey take your time!

[allbloodyhail]

"Uh." Spike blinked a few times, lost in his own thoughts, before coming back around to the fact he'd been asked a question. "Usually medbay. Or the room. You should know this, we live on 21st floor, room 17." Which is the same number printed on Spike's arm.

"If he's not either place he might be walking Iz."

/smooshes

[pushfall]

'The room' sounds so arbitrary in the way that she and Gretchen used to talk about their door room, as if having a room on a giant spaceship suspended inside of time and space is just something that's become so painfully normal. Claire wonders when she'll assimilate, too, or if she will at all. College was a bust, after all.

"Iz... the dog Iz?" She's heard about that dog, but she can't justify it being here for a number of reasons.

/loves on

[allbloodyhail]

"Oh... uh, yeah? It was their childhood dog or whatever. She stays with us or in the gardens, most of the time." Their dog. Nathan is still a hard word for him to pronounce.

"You should go find him, I wager, he'll be happy you're back. And I'm sure you'll meet the dog soon enough. She's about to have puppies, you know." He will keep rambling, Claire, get out while you can...