ARRIVAL ▒ 006

[ataraxites]

CHARACTERS: Any and all.
LOCATION: Basecamp, Medical and beyond.
WARNINGS: Implied (and possibly explicit) nakedness. Gore and violence.
SUMMARY: The Tranquility jumps again, while the camp is beseiged by bloodthirsty monsters.
NOTES: Can be found at the bottom of the post. This post is also a plot 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 ) The Tranquility sirens have been wailing since daybreak, heralding a jump, but they don't command the same attention as usual. The air tastes smokey and there are fire-glows blossoming up from the tree line in the southern portion of the jungle, but there's a more immediate problem to contend with. Jungle creatures come barrelling from the tree line, making bad, frenzied dashes across the expansive crash path, directly for basecamp. Shrieks, growls, and the thump of bodies and scrape of claws against wood and metal, all connote the besiegement that those on the ground can't clearly see. A monster, bigger than a black bear, with jagged bony growths breaking through its skin, slams its paws into wooden walls, where overgrown claws strip splinters from them, shaking them, testing their strength. It leaps, snapping, blood spatter from its open maw painting ruined wood. An animal that looks like a cross between a heron and some kind of feline, scrambles up into the trees, and launches itself down onto an unsuspecting crewmember, who screams as tooth and claw slice through his clothing, flesh, muscle. A horse-like creature with a bony head slams itself recklessly into the wall, pieces of wood shattering, provoking cries of alarm from the people within. And on and on. The initial wave eventually dies off, but the animals persist, and so do the fires in the distance. Those brave enough and capable enough might investigate and put a stop to it themselves, and perhaps gain an idea as to how they began. Those that stay behind have the arduous task of defending the camp, dealing with the swiftly rotting corpses of infested jungle animals, and fortifying the camp. It's ten hours later when the jump happens, sneaking up on those preoccupied with the current crisis. There's a tremble in the earth, shaking up through the trees, and 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. Most of the crew and the passengers are unaffected, but some experience a moment of unbalance, the world going black at the edges, and a sudden trickle of blood running from both nostrils, or bursting the fine veins in the eyes to make annoying red splotches on white. The moment passes, and the immediate nausea subsides. There is still work to do be. 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 claustrophobic 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 to air that smells smokey and a little gory, surrounded by an immense, vast jungle. As your vision clears, you realise you stand on the hull of a colossal spaceship, crashed on an unknown world, two moons hanging heavy in the sky above, visible as the sky begins to darken. In the distance, far out on a great swathe of torn up earth through the jungle is a campsite, surrounded by walls, and seemingly beseiged by sporadic attacks of monster. Hopefully, someone will think to come and help you. Otherwise, you best be ready to run. N O T E S Anything remaining within a mile radius of the ship when it jumps will be irreparably 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 scattered beyond the ship. Feel free to find all of your inventory items, or lose as many as you like, as they will be randomly distributed around the jump radius. They will also be able to find jumpsuits and other standard clothing in the wreckage of medical. 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, some characters will be affected by dizziness, nausea, and nosebleeds/eyebleeds for a moment. This will only apply to characters who are at ability grid levels three through six. Everyone else remains unaffected. This arrival log doubles as a plot log. Please feel free to be attacked by and kill as many monsters as you like. Breaches to the wall will occur, but the camp will not be completely overrun only thanks to the combined efforts of passengers and crewmembers. Those investigating the fires should mark it clearly in their subject header, and if you are touched by a GM/NPC tag, please feel free to continue to tag in whatever order. If you have any other questions, please don't hesitate to contact us via PM, the FAQ or Questions pages!

Comments

[hairrands]

"Huh," the clone grunts. Well, two Rey's means it'll be easier to remember names. "If they're still in there, we'll find them. Don't worry about the throat and the blue shit, it'll get better... you want to get off this planet, though, that's another story. I'm AJ."

[ventifact]

Rey's been doing her best to ignore the pain in her throat, but the reminder brings it back in full force. She grits her teeth, trying not to let her discomfort show. "What do you mean? There's a ship, and it's bound to have escape pods." Unless they'd all been fired off, in which case, things might get a little more difficult.

[hairrands]

"Nobody here knows shit about how to put something flight-worthy together, and the ones who do say it's hopeless because this huge pile of scrap had its engines blown off somewhere nobody can reach. It's all everyone can do to scrape together and survive in this jungle; so far, we're shit out of luck and so is anyone else who gets accidentally sucked in through one of those jump couches."

Despite the hopelessness of the situation, AJ sounds almost conversational, like she's talking about a storm-front meandering in. She's been using this down time to stretch her arms a little, to consider a few of the camp-members who are now scaling the grade to the hole near medical where, presumably, Rey emerged from. "You talk like you at least know a little about ships, though. I do mechanical work..." on beat up old Chevy's, but who's counting? "What about you?"

[ventifact]

As she listens, Rey's frown grows deeper, as do the worry lines between her brows. People who knew "something" about ships, huh? Well, she's one of them and she thinks she can do something about this hunk of metal. Maybe it's ambitious, but she'd spent a whole year of her life using scrap parts from tens of different ships to put just one back together.

The problem here is that she doesn't have a year. She might not have a month, a week, a day. Anxiety bubbles up, but she pushes it down. She can't think about mights right now. She has to focus on what's in front of her.

Rey watches AJ stretch for a moment before following her gaze towards other people. "I've worked on ships. And I can fly them." Most of that had been done in simulations, but who's keeping track?

[hairrands]

That catches AJ's attention. "That's something. That's actually worth something," she amends. "You willing to consider a trade to get off of this rock?"

[ventifact]

Rey inclines her head at that. Trading has been her lifeblood since she can remember, and apparently things aren't about to change now. Still, she remains as cautious as ever. "What kind of trade?"

[hairrands]

"I might be looking for a way out of here, too. Some people are, some people aren't. I'll help, but it sounds like you know more about the tech than I do and I haven't been getting anywhere. If I can join in, I want passage out of here for me plus one. That's the only non-negotiable."

[ventifact]

She slows her tread, thinking. This girl plus one more isn't hard to accommodate. Besides that, Rey had already been formulating a plan to get the entire ship in the air anyway. There would be plenty of room for however many people had crashed in it. But still, she hesitates. The last time she accepted help from someone who said they wanted off a planet, they had betrayed her.

Still. She doesn't have a year.

"What help can you offer?"

[hairrands]

"What help?" AJ splays her callused hands and flexes her bare biceps. She's not a naturally muscular person, but despite that she's been logging many hours in on digging holes and dragging tree trunks. She's earned what muscle she's got. "I can put together anything from rust-buckets on wheels to motion-sensing explosives, and I don't care about getting my hands dirty. That thing," she jerks her chin towards the wreck of the Tranquility, "might be the biggest scrap yard I've ever seen in my whole life, I just haven't worked my way around a space ship," and the way she says it makes it sound funny, "before. I pick things up quick, though, and I don't need hand-holding."

[ventifact]

Honestly, that's enough for Rey. Anyone who has half a mind for scavenging will be more useful than five who don't. "You'll do." It's meant to be more reassuring than it sounds, Probably. "Once my head stops pounding, we can start."