ataraxionlogs | THE CRASH

THE CRASH

CHARACTERS: Any and all.
LOCATION: Medical and beyond.
WARNINGS: Violence, implied (and possibly explicit) nakedness.
SUMMARY: Arrival in the crashed Tranquility

W E L C O M E
You wake up, alone in the dark. There's a breathing tube jammed down your trachea, and you're suspended in a tube of clear blue fluid. Through the fog you can see shadows of movement, the muted sound of alarms crying. 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 suddenly dropped several feet onto the opposite wall.

The impact is painful, winds you, and it takes several seconds to overcome and persuade uncooperative limbs to move. You barely have the time for it. All around you is chaos: the sirens of alarms are shrieking in your ears, drowning out the cries of confusion from the people awakening around you, trapped in their gravity couches or stumbling through the wreckage. Louder than that is a deep rumbling, coming from somewhere farther away, vibrating through the metal underneath you. It's hard to make out much of anything in the dim red light, but you catch sight of a sprawl of garbled black on your forearm and wonder--

Who are you? How did you get here?

A drip lands on your cheek. Another. You look up as a flash of light illuminates a rend in the outer wall high above you, a steadily increasing fall of raindrops showering through. Another rumble rolls through the wreckage around you, and you pull weak, unsteady legs underneath you, rising to a shaky stand.

M E D I C A L
There's a shout, nearby, and your attention turns from the hole high in the wall to the room around you. Standing sideways, the smooth doors of gravity couches under your feet, fallen wreckage and debris making obstacles in your path. But there are others here, climbing through it as best they can, or trapped inside their gravity couches, injured, or worse. You step over the body of a man in a jumpsuit, venturing further into the gloom of red. The shout comes again. Someone might need your help. Or they might have answers about what happened here.

O U T S I D E
It takes all the strength you have to climb up through the fallen structural beams and hanging cabling, metal slipping wet beneath your fingers and feet. Eventually you emerge, and in another flash of bright light realise you stand on the shell of some colossal structure, the shadows of dense jungle all around you. The night sky above is a violent flux of colors, a dense, roiling tower of cloud crawling with lightning as if on fire, thunder booming again and again as the deluge pours down. In the brief flashes of light you start to notice figures, further away, scattered across the shell. Dressed in dark jumpsuits, their shouts are drowned out by the storm, but their struggles are evident; lashing out, grappling, fighting each other for their lives.

There's a sound behind you, and as you turn one lunges towards you, a jagged shaft of metal in his hand. His eyes are wide, teeth bared, and as you stagger back he yells something, coming for you again: "You did this!"

N O T E S
Venturing through the medbay will discover the lockers and main bay, all heavily damaged. Characters will likely be able to salvage some belongings from the destroyed lockers - otherwise they will be able to find jumpsuits and other standard clothing in the wreckage.
The alarms will cut after two hours, a which point a looping audio message telling passengers to make their way to the blue lifts will be audible. The lifts, if investigated, will be missing, leaving only empty elevator shafts.
The nexus of the strange superstorm will disperse out into colorful clouds after approximately half an hour, at which point rainfall will ease to something less torrential. The storm will pass entirely after five hours. Dawn will come two hours after this.
The Tranquility's original crew members can be found amongst player characters, either in medical or outside of the ship already. They will similarly be suffering from memory loss, but worse than that, a small number of them will be extremely violent in attacking player characters, other crew, or even harming themselves.

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A little of his guard drops when hers does--at least enough that he lets his hands fall to his sides and lets his shoulders drop down, like an echo of her slump. Not completely at ease--who is--but better to be muddy and bloody and shirtless and wet and confirmed as an innocent man, rather than a muddy bloody shirtless wet murderer.

"Still might be," he offers, with good hard cheer, "only if I am, it's only a small psychotic bit. And it's a psychosis we're all sharing, since no one I've met has had anything sensible to say at all. Least of all this bloke."

The unconscious one, that is, and Sirius indicates him with a nod. She's completed her investigation, but still, Sirius doesn't step forward just yet to reclaim his burden. He leaves the fellow laying there instead, cheek pressed to the mud, as he pushes his fingers through his wet hair.

"Merlin." It comes out a mutter, directed inwards. The name means nothing to him except an oath. "How long have you been out here, anyways? I mean, away from the-- ship."

Shaking her head, she folds her arms up around herself, hunching her shoulders. Her hair's damp, but not drenched. Certainly not the kind of wet that would tell of being out during the superstorm that they'd first found.

"Not long. Since the earthquake." She glanced back towards it, then to Sirius. "Did you just say Merlin?" Her nose crinkled in a mixture of alarm and confusion. Though she didn't know much, she knew that was weird.

Little details like fairly dry hair are easier to notice with her stood closer to him. Sirius makes mental note, but doesn't say much on it. People were leaping out of that ship at all times, weren't they? And there's trees down, and things. Refuges.

Although then it's weird that she marks him as weird for saying Merlin. He feels a moment's hesitation, an interior check--is it weird? No, it's not weird. Can't say how or why he knows it isn't weird, just that it isn't.

"Yeah," he answers, slowly, "Merlin. As in, Merlin--" Er. Luckily, the phrase finishes itself: "--s beard. Merlin's pants."

Mental, how this remembering works. As soon as he's uttered the words, though, they click together naturally. Right, yeah. Merlin. A wise-looking bloke--wizard--portrait on the back of a card.

Casual as you like on his outside, Sirius shrugs. Merlin. Of course. "S' an oath, you know. That's really what's important, here? Merlin?"

"Yeah, it's important. You're swearing to a wizard."

She may not remember important details of her life or personal experiences, but she certainly remembers that. Every ten-year-old knows Merlin, but most people don't go around scowling his name when things aren't going right.

Skye scrutinizes him a moment longer, trying to figure out why the remark doesn't fit, why it sticks so wrongly in her teeth, but there's nothing there. She only closes her fist around straws, defeated by some kind of mental block blurring her memories.

As if it will answer the question, she asks, "Who are you?"

"A wizard, actually."

That's who. Sirius smiles, a little ruefully, and shrugs. Sorry, but it's true. Apparently. There are still so many holes, so many things he's not sure of. Easy basic information--his name, for example--escape him, but magic is written quite deep in him, not a feeling, not anything that he could put to words.

"Not Merlin," he adds. That one is also clear in his head. Merlin is more than a figure in a ten-year-old's bedtime story, and definitely more than him, even he's been going around setting accidental fire to sopping wet underbrush. (Magic!) "Other than that, I've not got very much. You?"

Disbelief trickled into her expression a moment, a heavy dose of skepticism trying to temper her excitement. It wasn't long, though, before a bright spark flashed behind her eyes, trusting his word. An airy feeling causes her chest to swell, but she stamps it down.

Focus. Right. There are more important things than the fact that magic is real.

"Daisy," She answered, though the name felt stiff on her tongue. It didn't settle as smoothly as it had earlier. Pieces are beginning to resist being fit together in her memory. "I worked with SHIELD. I feel like I'd remember something like magic, though."

Patiently, Sirius nods. Yes, this lack of remembering is to be expected. Don't ask how he knows it's to be expected, because he couldn't say: only that it is to be expected. You can't remember what you don't know, and muggles (a word both foreign and familiar by turns, depending on when he's thinking of it) don't know magic, because--

"International Statute of Secrecy," he explains, with a shrug. You know how it is. "People don't know about magic unless they've got it, or they're related to someone who's got it, or they've got proper clearances and things. Prime Ministers and presidents."

There's a beat before Sirius' eyebrow ticks up. Speaking of 'proper clearences'--

"You work with shields as, what. Blacksmith? Suit of armor curator?"

Undeterred by the change of subject, Daisy grabs hold of the magic topic like a dog with a bone and shakes it in her teeth, trying to really dig them in.

"But you're just telling someone. Isn't that a violation of some big, scary, international magic law?" Her eyebrows knit together over the bridge of her nose and she leans her head just slightly forward, shoulders hunched in a look of confusion.

His cavalier attitude stalls out at that question--and then continues to stall as the full realisation of just how right she is occurs to him. International Statute of Secrecy has a great many syllables, which suggests at some base kind of importance and.

And. Instinct makes him cast a glance up toward the sky, though he doesn't quite know why he does that, either--only that he does, scanning for the arrival of some damnation or another. That's got to be it, right? For violating the Statute.

Nothing happens.

"It's only international." He scans above their heads again, but when no bad news descends on his head, he looks back at Daisy again with a shrug that's a bit more flippant than he actually feels. "This looks a bit more than international to me. Maybe that makes it all right. And it's just you, innit," like that covers all sins; like he knows her so well. "You're not going to spread the word around, are you?"

Dark eyes track the movements of Sirius', trying to figure out precisely what he's looking for up there. Sparse stars wink back at her from an otherwise empty night sky. Shaking her head, she drops her gaze back to him, "Uh, we're talking about magic. That sounds like exactly the kind of thing people should know is real. Are you kidding me?"

As it turns out, SHIELD didn't manage to repress all of those Rising Tide instincts. Freedom of information and all.

"Er," says Sirius. "Does it."

Witty and gripping conversation. Behind his expression--amused, confused--he's thinking: memory charm. Modify her memory. Easy, right?

Maybe not. Because as soon as he thinks the words, he looks down at his hands and realises that he knows to do a memory charm in this case--that's what you do, when muggles find out about magic, everyone knows that, method of correction as old as the Statute itself. Maybe even older--certainly traditional, too, depending on which texts you read and who your great-great-great-great pureblooded grandfather was. Considering his brains are bloody well scrambled, attempting to artfully scramble her brains and nudge a few stray thoughts into proper place seems... well. Not worth the risk. She wouldn't look half as fit if she were drooling and staring into space.

A charming little smile tugs at the corners of his mouth as he looks back at her. "'Cos I was hoping it could be our secret, see. Wouldn't be much good to you if everyone knew."

On second thought.

She looks over at him then, weighs the obvious attempt at sweet-talking, and then glances down at the unconscious crewmember that she'd first spotted this guy dragging like a sack of potatoes through the woods.

Yeah. On second thought, maybe she better keep exactly that secret, or at least let him believe she will. A flattered smile, almost too saccharine to be genuine, settles on Skye's lips and she bats her eyelashes.

"Well," She relents. "When you put it like that …" She approaches him, hands slipping into her back pockets with an accompanying shrug. "In that case, since it's just between us, maybe you could tell me more while we figure out what to do with him." She nudges the still-breathing body with the toe of her boot.

Sirius lets his own smile take firmer root, as she sidles over--even if he's not certain whether or not he believes that smile of hers. Seems fake, but okay--and yet needless suspicion never won anyone any friends, and he's quite good at playing along, and anyways, if she's faking her smile she's at least thought to pretend to play along with him, which is, really, a step in the right direction. Now that he's got her attention, he will befriend her until she goes totally along.

All of these thoughts occur in moments, really, and all of them behind Sirius' smile. It breaks off a little when he spares the crewmember a glance.

"About, what. Magic?" You got it, girlfriend, and Sirius doesn't hesitate. When he narrows his eyes slightly at the crewmember's arm, the cloth of the jumpsuit is pinched in an invisible grip, and the arm is tugged upward by that pinch point, like there's a string attached. It looks a little funny, and a little grotesque, which admittedly isn't everyone's sense of humour.

"Think I can make his arm sparkle, if you like."

That'll help with the humour, probably.

"No way," Skye awes, eyes lighting up at the very notion. She's not sure she buys it, not entirely. Magic. But if it is real, if he really can do it … well. That's worth more than playing along a bit with hiding it. An enthusiastic breath slips out of her, but she chokes herself off, rallying for some sensibility as she points out. "I mean, go for it, but I don't know how that's gonna help hide him. Or stop him from trying to murder you more when he wakes up."

He snorts, dismissively. "C'mon. Think about it. If you woke up, and your arm was sparkling, wouldn't you be at least a bit distracted? Murderous rage or no."

Sound logic, that. Sirius hasn't yet recovered his wand--doesn't even know to go and recover it yet--and doesn't know how skilled he is at non-verbal spells, except, of course, he's accidentally discovered just how skilled he is at non-verbal spells.

The unconscious crewmember's arm flops to the left, and his fingers spread, baring his palm--and in the center of his palm is a glimmer--tiny, twinkling, as if the pinprick light of some far-off star has been embedded somewhere under his skin. Another one winks to life, and another, and another--spreading across his palm like a a rash, but the most beautiful rash in the world--and then down over his wrist, and there are lights under the sleeve of his jumpsuit, too, muffled by the fabric but still possessing that same merry twinkle.

Fingers flex in a wave. Hiya, Daisy. Sirius grins.

"See."

As elated as she was by the prospect, it comes as no surprise that Skye is downright giddy at the display. Laughter bursts from her lips and she covers her mouth with her hands to mask her joy, one palm smothering the jubilant sounds. Her eyes fly from the unconscious crew member to Sirius and back again before she crouches beside him and pokes at his arm cautiously, as if unsure as to whether or not the glimmering might be contagious, but too curious to resist getting a closer look.

"How does it work? Do you just … think it, and it happens?" She doesn't look at him as she asks, instead poking at the sparkling spots on the crew member's limp limb.

"Something like that, yeah." Non-committal and casual, like this is all no big deal. And it isn't, probably, but truthfully--truthfully, Sirius doesn't exactly know how he's doing it. It's him, all right, his handiwork without so much as moving his hands. Some of it seems to be self-assurance, confidence in an ability he can only think of as magic--which is the proper term, and he knows that, too, but a term that's too broad and unspecified. What would you call the branch of magic that can make a man's arm sparkle? Damned if he knows the answer to that one, but he does know the answer. Or ought to, anyways.

The sparkling lingers on, which means that he's probably good at magic, too. This fuels his self-confidence, which keeps the sparkles going, which adds more fuel to that confidence--on and on and on. (A magical circlejerk, you might say.) But it's been accidental as well, this magic, mostly in bursts of flame, and Sirius spares a quick glance at his hands, as if to make well certain that they're not going to set anything or -one on fire right now.

"It's got more practical manifestations as well," he tells her, without so much as giving hint to his general lack of knowledge, "really useful stuff. But why go for the useful when you can go for the entertaining, eh?"

"Yeah, I'll bet," She quiets for a while, letting him talk, fascinated with just eating up whatever information she can get and exploring the intensity of the glimmering light. Once satisfied, she does look up at him, finishing her thought with a less distracted tone of voice. "Infrastructure and stuff, I bet, right? What about summoning stuff? Witches and wizards do that all the time in movies, can you? Do you need all the stuff there to just, like, change it, or can you actually create it, because that breaks all kinds of scientific laws."

"Good thing it's magic, and not science, innit."

Which obviously means that all kinds of scientific laws are free to be broken. Sirius has a vague memory of someone far more stubborn and bull-headed about the scientific impossibilities and limitations of magic. Someone he liked very much, who was far more difficult and far less excited than Daisy is.

He likes the enthusiasm. Magic is aces, and anyone that share that opinion is that much closer to his heart. So he keeps his grin, even as he's casually shrugging off her question--

"I can do just about anything, really. Only Summoning just means calling something over to you. What you're asking about, that's more charms and transfiguration work, but I just happen to be tops at both of those as well."

He's pretty sure he is, anyways.

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THE CRASH

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