ataraxionlogs | ARRIVAL ▒ 002

Entry tags:

ARRIVAL ▒ 002

CHARACTERS: Any and all.
LOCATION: Basecamp, Medical and beyond.
WARNINGS: Implied (and possibly explicit) nakedness.
SUMMARY: The Tranquility jumps again.
NOTES: Can be found at the bottom of the post.

T H E C A M P ( C U R R E N T C H A R A C T E R S )
Clouds have rolled in, obscuring the high noon in grey shadow when the alarms start. Wailing through the air, not as keenly as it had when base camp still huddled in its shadow, but still loud enough to turn heads and give people pause.

It sends a shiver of nervous energy throughout camp. They were out of range the last time, and there is no sudden scrambling attempt at retreat, but the crowd does begin to thin. Some pick up and go, just to put distance between themselves and the inevitable, because you never know. Others stay behind, for whatever that reason might be. Those who were closer towards the ship emerge from the treeline in a hurry.

It's ten hours later when it happens. A tremble in the earth, shaking up through the trees, sending the jungle's wildlife into distressed flocks of movement and alarmed cries. Under the shrouded sun the wreck of the Tranquility begins to cord with lines of white light, threading across the hull like veins, some patches remaining dark, standing out against the vision like splotches burnt to the back of the eyelids. There's no great sound. In an instant, the ship is gone, a soft whomp, a feeling of air rushing past, the trees bending towards the site as if blown by a fierce wind. It's only a second. With a crack, the wreck returns, a rumble rolling through the air like thunder.

The earth shakes. The trees tremble. The ship groans, the sound echoing out like the cry of a wounded beast.

The jump has passed.

Before search and rescue can gather and see for themselves if anyone new was dragged from their homes, something strange happens. A gas mask, old fashioned and heavy, round-eyed, with a filter like a muzzle at the mouth, lands in the packed earth at someone's feet. With a clatter of plastic and metal, something that was once a radio receiver apparently plummets from the air, shattering on impact when it strikes the metal framework of a communal tent, and another lands in softer earth, intact. Tin cans of food, earthenware bottles of water, candles wrapped in paper and tied in string, a box of matches, a set of well-used playing cards with roughed up corners, a rough woollen blanket, a pillow, a gas lamp all hit the ground throughout camp, or are discovered in the jungle beyond.

This unusual rain of items ceases, hardly a minute after it has begun.

M E D I C A L ( N E W A R R I V A L S )
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. All around you is chaos: the sirens of alarms are shrieking in your ears, close and claustrophic in the wreckage of the medical bay you've awoken in, lit dim and red. Around you, others are waking up, falling from other gravcouches, stumbling to their feet. Light catches your eye, and you look up to see a huge rend in the outer wall high above you, overhung by broken structural beams and damaged cabling.

Climbing up takes all the strength you have.

You emerge in bleak, grey sunlight, surrounded by an immense, vast jungle. As your vision clears, you realize you stand on the hull of a colossal spaceship, crashed on an unknown world, two moons hanging heavy in the sky above. In the distance, far out on a great swathe of torn up earth through the jungle are a clustered crowd of figures, moving towards the wreck.

Your welcome party, but are they friend or foe?

N O T E S
Anything remaining within a mile radius of the ship when it jumps will be irreperably damaged. Soft organics will be pulverised, while all trees and plants will initially appear fine but crumble to pieces within a day (or sooner if disturbed). Non-organic material will also be weakened, bending or falling apart when touched.
Newly arriving characters venturing through the medbay will discover their inventory items somewhere in the heavily damaged locker banks. They will also 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 wreck will show increased signs of instability for a few days after the jump, and will have seemed to have sunk further into the rock of the cliff than it was before.
As mentioned, items as described above will also rain down on camp and all areas beyond it. Feel free to find these in sporadic quantity.
If you have any other questions, please don't hesitate to contact us via PM, the FAQ or Questions pages!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It's a rough arrival; one among many, subsequent thuds and groans of strangers a charming soundtrack to her own hard, wet landing, sliding in the fluid that's come with her when she first tries to get her bearings, stand up. She tries knees first, and then slowly a bit higher, her head ringing from the impact, and looks up to see the pod she fell from - at this point there's nothing much to the observation that that isn't where she went to sleep last night, and she regards it dispassionately. Whatever purpose she was brought here for, it seems superseded by the absolute state of the ... ship? in which she's found herself.

She wipes fluid from her face, ineffectually, pushes her hair - thick and tangled with it - back and picks her way through the wreckage. She will need to climb out, that's obvious; there's probably something worth scavenging down here, first, and she is sensible before she's desperate. She's naked, tired, and most of her hurts - if she can possibly avoid having to come back in here, later, all the better. Picking her way through the broken lockers, she finds what would've been her own by sheer accident, attracted by the glint of light on metal that identifies her own jewel casket.

Benevenuta crouches for a better angle, and so no one who isn't paying attention anyway can see the moment where in another life she might've sat down, suddenly, much struck. Numb fingers explore, find-- yes, it is what she thinks. And a backpack that she recognizes (she's getting this awful stuff all over a Proenza Schouler, and she'd despair if not busy being grateful that whatever's inside is protected by the leather), that was a gift -

And a crossbow. Hers, as well.

She hefts it, tests the weight, finds the bolts and secures them in one of the pack's empty pockets.

So, she thinks, that's how this is going to be.

The first night she spends alone, waiting in the shadows of the ship until she's certain that those who arrived with her are gone; digging out some of the Tranquility-issue clothes and tearing fabric, using it and accumulated rain-water to clean the dried, sticky gravcouch fluid from her body methodically. Selecting something to wear, packing more clothes into what she'd found of her own. Waiting hours, patient as a rock, until night falls to cover her ascent and subsequent undignified tumble from the wreckage. Hungry, tired, and angry at her own fear, she marks the passage of those who went before and strikes out in another direction, catfooted, leaning against a tree when her vision swims and she knows a moment's regret.

Sheer stubbornness keeps her moving, curious in spite of herself at the alienness of her surroundings; she brings down something birdlike and pink with a crossbow bolt that proves more effort expended than it's worth (she does take some of the unbloodied feathers) and spends what feels like a very long time on her knees beside its bizarre corpse, laughing into her hands.

This is all so fucking absurd.

She takes the bolt, and upon consideration, buries the body lest it attract questions, later.

In the morning, she stumbles - and it isn't as much of an act as she'd like it to be, exhausted - back to where she marked the campsite--

"I was frightened," she says, repeating it in accented English when German gets only blank looks. "I get lost."

It's not without a glimmer of humour she adds, "We are very lost, yes?"

Granny of course speaks not a word of Foreign. It's surprising this one took so long to show up, but some people can be stubborn. "More lost than oughta be possible."

Obviously it is though. "We all are."

'This one' doesn't look stubborn; she looks tired, messy, and a little bit confused--

"Yes," after a slight pause, the repetition leading into the lilt of a question, "Yes, I say?"

At least, she's relatively certain that was what she said. In fairness, the last time she was obliged to rely on her English, she was learning it in Glasgow, in the '40s. Still, she hasn't entirely neglected it in the subsequent years, so she presumes that the strain of this place must be more for an older woman, probably worth repeating, and sets it aside. The more important question follows: "There is water here, also?"

Edited 2015-10-09 05:22 (UTC)

Granny might be old, but she's tough. And she's pleased to be hearing the right questions now. "Water 'n' food. Enough to get by."

Water's a pretty important consideration, really. And she should know sooner than later. "The rain's safe, but the river ain't. River water burns." So don't drink that.

Max looks at her with a straight face, re-wrapping a now neatly swathed set of candlesticks he'd gotten to place in his pack. Is she talking to him? She's looking at him, and he's now officially looking at her, so he imagines that was the intention (which always surprises him, because of all the people, he never figured himself to look much worth speaking to; what the heck, guys). At least this one isn't hitting him in the head with things. Though the sudden rain of items from the sky earlier did the job well enough. He's got a little gouged cut on his hairline where a tin can tried to murder him as it rained.

His brow twitches upward slightly at the question.

Are they lost?

What is your interpretation of 'lost'? He knows exactly where he is. Camp is etched in his blood on his cloth-made map.

...

...

Max shrugs at her.

She stares back at him for a few moments, the half-hearted attempt at friendliness dissipating into an awkwardness that stretches out past his shrug. It seems as if something else should happen - he did respond, however blankly, it'd be rude to just walk away - but it takes her a short time to dredge through her tired mind for what 'something else' should be. Her throat is dry, her muscles ache, and she'd rather be regrouping - for all that, having begun the interaction and not having actually been dismissed, she feels obligated to hold up both ends of it.

"May I look?" --eventually, gesturing to the gouge at his hairline.

"No."

Oh, shoot, no, that's not polite. But it's his usual kneejerk, honest reaction: no thanks, he doesn't want anyone's hands on him, no touching, he doesn't know you from Eve. But despite how he bristles at the question, he catches himself. And isn't it just swell that he actually realizes he's being stand-offish or rude? He's learning, okay.

Granted, he'd still turn and walk away if he found nothing else of interest about her, but he's actually still caught off guard that it's a jump cycle again. Didn't it just happen? He loses track of time so easily.

He clears his throat, trying for another angle. A nicer one. Slightly.

"You just arrived."

... I did say slightly.

To her credit (or something), when she drops her hesitantly raised hands there's less relief (at sliding out of self-imposed obligation) than there is lingering concern (that he is going to get an infection if he leaves it like that, this place is filthy and too much carelessness will render moot how relatively minor abrasions on the head tend to be in comparison to how they bleed). She considers him for a few moments, visibly weighing whether or not she wants to press the issue, before she settles on a compromise--

"Yes," in a tone of concession. Probably she should rest, hydrate, eat something and get her bearings before she starts trying to take responsibility for the wellbeing of imperfect strangers. "Someone should look, please. I am - a physician."

But if not her, then, you know, someone? Clean that up, terse hobo.

"Hmm." Because obviously that is a decent way to say 'welcome to an alien planet. To be fair to Max, there's really no decent way of saying that anyway. But he's a smidge uncomfortable, mostly because he still definitely doesn't want her anywhere near him, but he also is well-aware that infection is something you need to avoid and he has no real way of looking at the injury to potentially stitch it up. Not that it's necessary, per se: he doesn't mind scars.

But a physician. Free medical. Hrmphhmphmh.

He cocks his eyebrow at her.

"Hardly the time to worry about anyone but yourself."

This is him 90% of the time, you know. It pays off.

"If there is person you prefer to look, you should go to them," she says, evenly. Because. He's right - this is not a great time. She knows she'll be fine; it doesn't make the discomfort less, it just means she's more used to pushing through it.

(Which can be a problem, sometimes - there's such a thing as your pain threshold being too high.)

"If not, I do not have better place to be."

Than here at camp, so. If he has need of her, she doesn't intend to be difficult to find. After a moment, with the frankness of exhaustion, "It is sensible to be useful, no?"

Hrmm... He does consider the options. He hates getting things done, causing favors — hell, he hates help in general because, really, he's on his own and despite his gradual, slow as hell leanings toward being helpful, he's still an ass half the time who prefers to be away from the rest of society. He doesn't know her, either. But then, she's unarmed and the camp is buzzing with the others. If she tried to murder people now under the guise of good humanitarianism, she'd probably be in for a rude awakening.

He stares at her for a good moment, and then, rather deadpan —

He takes a seat on a nearby tree that had been mangled from the jump launch.

...

Well? You wanna take a look at it or what? He looks expectantly at her, motioning with a hand that is a bit crooked in the fingers; last few got crushed, not counting the sad excuse for a pinky finger on the other hand. He bows his head slightly and keeps tabs on his makeshift knife he keeps on him, just in case.

You never know.

Go ahead, look at it, before he changes his mind.

A moment comes and goes where she considers looking at his hands, first, but - no, she won't press past what he has implicitly agreed to, that's fair. That's sensible, when he has a knife that he's so conscious of, because that which doesn't kill you is still painful and annoying.

Her hands are cold and damp from her night in the elements; her examination is brisk and firm but careful, all the same, not to cause any avoidable pain in the process. Some of the fabric she'd torn to strips the night before is still clean and in her bag, so she rolls her shoulder forward to drop it into her arm where she can get it open and fish around for what she's looking for - uses the fabric she finds to clean the blood away and let her get a better look.

"No stitch," she announces, "but you want to keep it clean. Cover for a while. Check again it isn't infected."

"Mmmn," is his complicated response. He doesn't wince or flinch at the prodding, mostly because he's had far worse injuries that hurt way more — and at her instruction he shrugs and nods. He knows. Infection is bad. Takes arms and legs and all sorts of unpleasant things, out in the Wastelands. He's no stranger to it. As she looks, she may notice slight patches where his hair doesn't grow in — little nicks and cuts turned into scars; one is on the other side of his forehead, crossing into his hairline. Another thing she may notice is that his forearm has a clear burn mark, fresh but healed, in the shape of a hand.

He finally (surprisingly) adds in a low voice, "Can fell out of the sky."

You can put two and two together.

There are a lot of things to notice about Max, not least of them the scars and what they say about him - his suspicion is no more surprising than his stoicism in the face of being poked by a stranger who, in the oddness of this interaction, has neglected to introduce herself.

Not purposefully. It's just seemed unimportant, in the sort of way where it just hasn't occurred to her yet to think of at all.

"Your fortune to stand in wrong places," she observes, which is quietly dry enough to also mean 'in front of her when she arrived'.

You're very right. Names are pointless to him; he hasn't given his to anyone here, anyway. Though a few know it thanks to those goddamn mental links. He huffs at the reply but doesn't seem annoyed more than in agreement. Yeah, he's not very lucky when it comes to avoiding physical injury.

After a hesitant pause:

"Not a lot of fortune here. Doctors are good to have around camp."

Not that he's around it often. But he's just saying. You have a place here in particular.

"I think this is so."

Doctors are usually good to have around; her specializations are broad enough to make her more useful than some, even. She's not someone who generally struggles to find herself a niche, in a new situation, but it's certainly helpful when it's as obvious as this, and it doesn't hurt that she's (in less oddly stressful circumstances) as good with people as with their body parts.

Not that this is going so terribly, all things being equal.

"If you have trouble," she says, leaning back and wiping her hands on the cloth, "I will not be far, probably."

He hums in his throat, distant. Clearly not one for social etiquette or talking, and his eyes never seem to stay on any one place for very long. Locking on to someone else's gaze is torturous, most days. He rubs his hands on his pants, more so just something for them to do, and then he rises to his feet.

"Sure."

Which is better than an ellipses, right? His eyes look at something to her left over her shoulder, though what is not really clear; there's nothing there, but he doesn't seem bothered, shrugging as he adjusts his scarf deeper into his coat lining.

"Shouldn't — wander."

And then Max... wanders toward the jungle himself.

He never said he followed his own advice.

That the German receives no more than a blank look is only because it takes his brain a second to reorient at the sight of her. Her, here.

"Anya," he says, his tone not unhappy to see her beneath its tight urgency. They must have missed each other in the chaos that first day, but she doesn't belong here. She isn't ZDG, she wasn't taken at Olympus, and if she's here that means REAPERS closing in beyond ZDG ships. In the other cities. In Zion.

"What do you remember?" —in Russian, reflexive. "Where did they strike?"

His certainty is what gives her pause when she looks back at him with an equally blank lack of recognition, for all that she understands the words he uses perfectly well. If not their meaning - who is he, to speak to her so urgently? Anya is not an uncommon name for a Russian woman, and her face is not so distinct, she thinks, that she could never be mistaken for another.

But he is very sure.

She falls back a step, intimidation in the way she makes her body and the space she occupies smaller by the gesture, and says, "I don't speak, I'm sorry," a little hesitantly, as if he's an animal she isn't sure won't bite her for saying so. She uses English, but then again in German, in case he'd understood that better, "I don't speak Russian, my name is Svenja. Svenja Brandt."

Silence answers. He isn't a spy, isn't trained to spot a lie even if he occasionally displays a knack for it, and he can't tell if there is one here. Truth isn't something he takes as a given, but then, he doesn't know why she'd lie.

He can imagine, however, how a person might come to forget their own name. His blood runs cold with it. Is that what the REAPERS are doing to them?

"What do you remember?" he tries again, searching for words in halting German this time. "Before this place."

She meets his gaze somewhat uncertainly, playing up real hesitation with skilled artifice, ruthlessly quashing her very real unease to better control what happens next. (Can she? Let's find out.)

"Before this place," she repeats, not precisely a stalling tactic. She remembers very clearly. She does not remember this man in the slightest - her instinct is not to leave. It's to know more, and she answers him with that in mind - truthfully: "I was at home, after work, it was - later than I planned, I didn't get as much done as I meant to. I went to bed."

And woke up here.

She says it as if there's nothing at all amiss, nothing unexplained about that course of events - and maybe there isn't, for her, but the description is so vague it doesn't tell him anything.

The corners of his mouth pinch, and he pushes on.

"Where? When?"

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

ARRIVAL ▒ 002

open; the day after the jump.

Re: open; the day after the jump.

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granny vs. max; there are two types of people...

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