ataraxionlogs | (no subject)

CHARACTERS: EVERYONE
LOCATION: MED BAY
WARNINGS: ... Partial nudity? It should be pretty tame, but let me know if I need to add anything.
SUMMARY: Side-effects of a jump may include disorientation and temporary memory loss. Fortunately, there are a handful of others who have been through this before.
NOTES: Yes, it's a rehashing of the game premise. Don't worry, you can personalize your own (re-)introduction!

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. 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.

Don't worry, 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. They will help you through your disorientation, even though they might suffer from it too.

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.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Nepeta also folds her hands behind her head. Since she can't really straighten up any further, she stands on her tiptoes like an awkward ballerina.

She is having such a hard time not breaking out into a grin. Only a constant mantra of don't break character keeps her expression as stony as a Victorian gentleman's.

"Not at all, good sir. Should I be frightened?"

It -- she -- hm.

Holmes' hands tighten behind his back, and at once he looks puzzled, giving Nepeta another quick once-over before he (shockingly, suddenly, gosh, Nepeta, don't hold it against him) breaks the fourth wall.

"What is that voice, is that my voice? Attempted. That's not your voice."

Don't worry Holmes, the fourth wall means nothing and everything to Homestuck.

Nepeta finally drops down, laughing as she relaxes. "I was purrtending, silly! Haven't you ever roleplayed before?"

"Well, naturally, of course."

As students and snake charmers and crotchety old men and beggars and women and --

"But why now?"

Wrong answer. Nepeta just translated of course as I ENJOY MAKE-BELIEVE SILLYTIMES AND I WILL GLADLY ENGAGE YOU IN PROPER, SAFE PRETENDYTIMES. COME LET US FROLICK IN THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF FANTASY.

That may be why she's staring at Sherlock as though he's the greatest thing to happen since she arrived on the ship.

"Beclaws it's fun!"

Holmes has no idea what he's gotten himself into. Absolutely no idea.

"Duly noted," he replies after a pause, even though it's not duly noted or even necessarily understood, because when he deigns himself to play a role, it's with a purpose, generally for a case - and though that's often, and, yes, rather fun, he doesn't see much for her reason now.

He tries to remember what being a child is like. He recalls a pirate hat he had to be heartily bribed to remove.

Nepeta will show no mercy.

On the bright side, Holmes is making a positive impression for his species. It's strange to her, seeing so many adults in the same vicinity not only being nice to each other, but to the adolescents too. Interacting with adults--adult aliens--is almost surreal. It's relieving to know that they like roleplaying and not eating the young.

"What's your favorite character to play? Mine's a cat! She has two mouths like my lusus did, and a litter of kittens that she sometimes has to purrtect from her dragon best friend."

Don't be so sure about that conclusion, Nepeta. You've only seen him interacting with a child he doesn't mind so far. He'd at least be delighted to know that he's serving well as impromptu ambassador.

'Lusus', the Latin for 'freak', though he's not sure why to accentuate that word in particular with the different language. A pet name, the two mouths and the dragon friend lending credence towards it being an intellectual creation, perhaps an 'imaginary friend' as children are inclined to have. And perhaps some 37-year-old men who haven't yet noticed their roommate has left at some point during their thought process.

"The chaste, delicate, coy nature of a woman being difficult to replicate in a man's body, particularly with certain strong jawlines, facial features, physical builds. A challenge is refreshing. I call her Francine." He says this with pride, gazing off for a moment, chin high. His eyes squint a little. "Either that or the exuberant squash merchant."

She has impossibly low standards. As long as he doesn't try to kill or creep on her, Holmes is still a good guy in her eyes.

Nepeta doesn't bat an eyelash at the thought of Holmes pretending to be a female, even if she doesn't quite follow the 'chaste, delicate, coy' part of the equation. Instead she nods eagerly and envisions a future of much internet roleplaying, maybe a little dress-up. The safe kind, of course. Hopefully Francine isn't a scary lady like Vriska's character.

"I'm sure AC would love to meet Francine sometime! Oh, AC is my character. I'm Nepeta!"

While Francine isn't quite the marquise, she is not one to be trusted. More bite than bark. Trains shudder in her wake all across the globe.

Holmes really does have no idea what he's inspiring here. Children always have escaped him.

"Ah! The name is Holmes. Sherlock Holmes, that is." Even as she is, she introduces herself as everyone else has - the first name first and foremost, an intimate introduction. "'AC'," he repeats, and after taking a second or two to briefly rifle through all possible combinations of names it could be an abbreviation for, "standing for-?"

Nepeta can't help but giggle at how Sherlock introduces himself. It sounds like a dramatic line out of a movie.

"It stands fur 'arsenic catnip,' Mr. Holmes. That's my Trollian handle!"

She pauses for a moment. He probably didn't understand a thing she just said. Talking to people is a lot like talking to Jasper, except she has a better frame of reference to start from when explaining things to a dead cat.

"It's just a pseudonym I used on the internet. Back home, my furriends all lived far away from me, so I usually had to talk to them through instant messaging. Trollian's pretty much like any other IM program, except it had this feature where we could talk to people at diffurent points in their time line. But that's another story!"

Then... she doesn't like the cats? All the puns, a cat character, all the mentions of felines, and yet an attempted poisoning of the things within her name. Perhaps she just flat out didn't know what the word meant. Holmes studies her for a moment, curiously, before continuing.

Sort of. There are way too many things that she's said that don't make a lick of sense. Holmes is just beginning to think the young girl is mildly unhinged, but perhaps that's his being culturally insensitive in this situation.

"Perhaps our-- technological differences being more widespread than I initially thought."

Then again, Holmes, could you judge what a mildly unhinged troll looks like? For all you know she could be completely normal.

If you said that you'd be wrong but hey it's the principle that counts.

"Quite pawsibly! I don't know much about Earth's time lines except fur a few peoples'."