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

[welcome]

[Cecil leans over this girl, frowning with concern. She's a bit shell-shocked, he guesses. Poor dear.

He kneels down beside her.]

If your hands won't do, I'll offer you mine.

[trouvaille]

( the exhale she releases is too quick and explosive to be called a sigh, more like - coming back to herself all of a sudden. she flattens her hands, deliberately, stretching her fingertips out as far as they'll go, and then pushes back and sits up straighter, looking up at him. )

Why?

( --well. )

[welcome]

Because it seems necessary.

[He holds out one hand, smiling, encouraging.]

[trouvaille]

( it takes her a few moments more to decide that she's going to take it, letting him help her up - she feels coltish and unsteady and annoyed about it, like the feeling that you get in dreams when you're running and nothing happens. maybe that's what this is. maybe she's going to wake up. )

Thanks. I-- yeah, thank you.

[welcome]

[Cecil squeezes her hand just once, then lets her go.]

I'm happy to help. My name is Cecil -- can I have yours?

[trouvaille]

( her expression is blank, momentarily-- then, right. introductions. the times she does and does not remember that those are a thing people do are largely unpredictable, but the latter more regularly than the former, and only partially because it's very rare that she ever meets somebody who doesn't already know what her name is, whose daughter she is, a general idea of her family's net worth. )

It's Ilde- I'm Ilde.

( Ihl-dey. her grandfather always pronounces it the german way, Ill-dah, and she thinks there's something possessive about it; this is my granddaughter. i give her this name. she thinks, she probably can't call him from here. wherever here is. if here is real.

it can't be real. it just can't. )

[welcome]

[It's certainly an unusual name. But then, Cecil is quite accustomed to unusual things. He continues to hover, concern evident on his face.]

Is there anything I can do for you, Ilde?

[trouvaille]

( she manages not to say, plaintively, I want my father. Cecil can't help with that, and-- realistically, Emery's presence would not help anything. he's not a man with many practical uses. she'd only be more agitated trying to mind him, as if he weren't a grown man who's been minding himself for years. )

I don't -- I don't think so. I don't know.

[welcome]

[He touches her shoulder, gently, lightly. It's meant to be a soothing gesture, and it's all he knows to do.]

I understand. It can be very hard to know anything at all. But if you come across something, I'd be glad to help.

[trouvaille]

That's kind of you.

( if it sounds a little bit like she's mildly bewildered by that, that...probably says more about the company she keeps than Cecil. )