thisavrou_log | [Plot] What Could Have Been

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[Plot] What Could Have Been

Who: The Entire Moira
When: Mid September 22nd - 25th
Where: All over the ship
What: Holes in reality, holes in reality everywhere.
Warnings: None so far, please mark your content!

Hey, what's that sound? It sounds like a sharp whine of white noise and moving air, and quiet. And it's coming from a glowing crack that appears to be... floating in midair inside the ship. Surely that can't be good, right? How come they're appearing all over the Moira? And why do they show such bizarre images when you get close enough...?

((OOC: Plot details are here, feel free to use this post or make new ones! :D Any questions, feel free to hit me up at

kouject, otherwise GO NUTS GUYS, AU SHENANIGANS~))

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[CLOSED]

How had she not noticed? How could she have gone an entire year and never thought about him? She had wondered, occasionally, where Ivan was and if he wanted to sneak off somewhere, but the call of food, drink, and dancing had always pushed the thought away. And now his name is ringed in red and even though she knows what she's going to find when she gets to his room, she keeps hoping, praying despite everything, that it's a mistake. That the Moira and her systems are just malfunctioning. That Ivan will flash that smile that tells her she's worried over nothing, that he's there to comfort her because she's worked herself up into a tizzy again.

There's no Ivan, no smile, there's nothing in the room. And when she closes the door behind her it's dark, and when she starts screaming it echoes.

The room disappears, replaced with chunks of open space lined in glowing blue, and Elizabeth is her own light source as tears show her everything and anything her mind grabs onto-- space, an oncoming car, water dripping from the ceiling, piles of lingerie, banquet tables, a child being dragged by his ear by his mother, and them.

Everthing else disappears when Elizabeth sees that image. The bed is exactly where his used to be, and she's sitting on top of him. They're both naked, talking after sleeping together, and Elizabeth can see even in the fuzzy image that she's glowing. She's so happy, and he looks so sincere that it physically hurts Elizabeth to know he might never look at her like that again. She sits down against the wall and watches her own romance like it's a film, numb, and trying to remember how she felt during those moments. It's impossible, the feelings and the memory won't come.

[OPEN - September 25th]

When the door opens again, it's clear that the room is the source of the tears-- they're everywhere like some creepy room with multiple projectors running movies of the same people at different moments. And Elizabeth's in the center, unresponsive and staring through one of them. Her greatest secrets are laid completely bare right now, and she can't bring herself to care that someone is in there with her, seeing everything. Her powers, her heart, what made her feel like she had a life after Rapture and Columbia.

[Ivan's not the only one missing. Once Wanda's had the 'cure' and removed herself from the psychic chaos of the party, it becomes immediately clear that once again her twin is gone.

The jungle now sports a new clearing thanks to Wanda's rage at the entire situation.

She has also isolated herself pretty intensely, but even in her solitude it's difficult to miss the tears. She can see Sokovia, both damaged and whole, her parents, her brother, the Avengers...

Sometimes they are good alternates, but sometimes it's so awful Wanda has to look away. There are timelines where Steve can't come for them, where she sits caged and bound until Ross needs a weapon. Sometimes she is the only one to survive the experiments. And sometimes she can see her brother in what she can only assume is some sort of Avengers getup with the others. Crossbones never had a chance against the twins, never gets to do more than think about the bomb before they've disarmed him. The images mean nothing to her although she feels a pit of sick dread in her stomach that seems like more than it ought to be.

The energy signature isn't subtle and it's only a matter of time before Wanda traces it back to the source and goes to crouch beside her friend.]

Elizabeth?

[Well, at least Wanda knew already, Elizabeth thinks dimly as her friend walks through the sad sack show of Elizabeth's first relationship. Some of the images don't have Ivan in them, though-- a couple of them have another man. Older, cynical-looking from his expression, armed, stubble. From the way he's interacting with Elizabeth though, it's obvious who he is.]

I'm always the one saying goodbye. [Her voice is quiet and rough, she hasn't used it in days.] I thought I wouldn't have to this time. He promised to take me with him.

It turns out it's exhausting being in a body that's recovering from a year-long coma. It's not like Tex is doing much, and she really isn't suffering the cognitive effects that people who have been in a coma have to deal with, but she's still sleeping a lot. She spent most of the afternoon dozing off and on here in the medbay. But she's not without her visitors, and after dinner Ryuuzaki had arrived to spend a portion of the evening reading to her. She appreciates this, since as of now she's too weak to hold a book for very long.

She watches him settle in with the book, taking in his usual appearance, thinking how easily she might have discounted him as being odd until their time on the planet where they had crashed. He's constantly touching his mouth with his fingers in a thoughtful manner, sitting with his legs drawn up in the chair, and though she knows he's athletic, he often slouches, as though he wishes her were shorter. She had never really given him a second glance until they had danced at that party.

She's engaging with the story as he begins, but she's also thinking about them and their relationship. Not that this is a relationship, as that word is used colloquially. They're just...casually together now, in some capacity, or at least he doesn't feel compelled to abandon her to her own devices until she's well again. He probably knows he'd never sleep with her again if he did that. Yet she had tried to prevent him from seeing her this way at first, so it's not like he wouldn't have had an excuse never to show up. But he's made it quite clear he's invested in her in more than a obligatory way. He'd brought her cards and spent time sitting with her and talking with her. He'd brought her cookies, the cutest little koala cookies she'd ever seen. It's enough to make her wonder if that year—that time they'd spent together on that planet that hadn't felt anything close to being a year—had been long enough for him to develop real feelings for her.

In any case, the man's voice is really pleasant to listen to. He's got a smooth baritone voice, with an English accent, and it's a nice way to frame the story. He's about ten minutes into his reading when Tex starts to realize she's probably dozed off again. The dream is strange, though, seemingly separated by her awareness of the rest of the room by a glowing, pulsating, jagged line in midair. She lazily yawns and tries to open her eyes, only to realize she has them open. She narrows them slightly, blinking in confusion, straining to look closer.

"Wait, Daniel—" She raises her hand slightly, to signal to him to pause in his reading. "Do you see that?"

Edited 2016-09-24 19:09 (UTC)

[In the wake of spending essentially a year partying, Pharah is combating the embarrassment and guilt of having been caught up in it by throwing herself back into what she knows best. As a messanger on the ship, some of her time is devoted to her work assignment. The rest is spent patrolling the hallways, kitted out, and maintaining as close to a strict regimen as she could keep in this place.]

[The little glowing cracks, of course, demand inspection, and she can be found staring deep into any one she witnesses. There is very little she can glean from the actual phenomenon - science was not her specialty - but the images within are hard to ignore.]

Good End

This is the first one she sees, taken in and standing to watch it unfold. It's a few years before the Swiss Headquarters blew up, and while there is some hesitance, her mother relents and Pharah is allowed to join Overwatch.

Here, in this reality, she flourishes. There are complications, there is tension, but because she was allowed into the organization, she's able to be there and help sort things out. The destruction of the Swiss Headquarters never happens. She maintains a close and healthy relationship with her mother. She watches as good friends retire, happy. Healthy.

She'll be smiling brightly for this one.

Bad End

But, when there are infinite alternate realities, not all of them can be the good kind. It starts out similarly enough that for a while Pharah thinks she's watching the same thing, but then once admitted into Overwatch, she fails to help keep it going. The Swiss Headquarters still explodes, but this time there are civilians involved. Jack is gone, her mother is gone, Talon grows more powerful and Pharah's forced to join the underground, giving up pride and dignity and fighting purely for survival. She can't save anyone,in this iteration.

She can't even save herself.

Wildcard

Have an alternate reality she should see? Or should she happen in on someone else's?

Edited 2016-09-27 15:23 (UTC)

I know.

[She doesn't even need to look at the images to understand. Wanda's pain finds a mirror in Elizabeth's, a slight variation on the same melody.]

And you think you are finally done saying goodbye, but then this place...

[Something always happens to rip the wounds back open after you're sure they've healed. It's never actually okay, like the Ingress is actively toying with them. Give Pietro back as soon as Wanda's starting to stand on her own. Take him away once they've finally made up about her hiding the truth of his death. And how long have Pietro and Ivan been gone? Days? Weeks? Months? And this awful place had addled everyone's brains so badly they hadn't even noticed.]

What's a real feeling? It's something he's asked himself a few times since his return to clarity.

He'd liked Allison well enough until recently, in the distant, passive way that he ever likes anyone, which is more of a general lack of objection to their presence. Now his interest in and regard for her feels strange to him because it's more active. He'd had this kind of feeling towards Darcy on the Tranquility, but it had been both more and less intense: more because the things they'd gone through and the time they'd spent working together resulted in greater intimacy and emotional attachment, less because that attachment hadn't been consummated in any way. With Allison, it's that he's discovered something, something at which his existing emotions hadn't even hinted, and he now wants to investigate the nature of his discovery in greater depth.

One thing that's clear is that once her body has recovered from a year of inactivity, she probably won't need his protection or help. That's interesting. It's also interesting to test his own reaction to her return to the way she'd looked when he'd first met her -- the way the same expressions play out over a different face.

So he visits her to read to her and amuse her for a little while every day, driven by his curiosity and, if he's honest, his desire to eventually continue their sexual relationship. He's not sure that either of those things could exist without the other.

He's ten minutes into the fifth chapter of a book about guerrilla fighters on a desert planet when she interrupts him. He glances up in response to her query.

What is that? His first guess is that something is happening to the ship again, but what, he's not sure. It doesn't look related to the jellyfish-like creatures that had been everywhere a while ago... but it's rough in a way that suggests action and incident, not something happening smoothly or as the result of someone's direct intention.

His expression is both intrigued and slightly appalled.

"I do. If we need to get out of here quickly... how fast do you think you can move? I'll carry you if I have to."

If there are visible cracks in the atmosphere, hanging there, and if the truth about many of the things he's encountered in space matches up mostly to what he'd otherwise call wild suspicions, then the idea that this crack may open and things may come through it isn't far-fetched. It's not the only thing that could happen, though. What else should he prepare himself for?

She hasn't even been allowed to try sitting up on her own yet. "I can't move at all," she admits with a frown. "You'll have to carry me for sure."

The crack in space opens wider. She recognizes now what's being shown through it.

It was the interior of the Pelican she had crashed in after leaving Blood Gulch. It could have been just any Pelican, she knows, except for the fact that her black-armored form was sitting in the pilot's seat. There were no signs of York sitting in the gunner's seat, which meant this wasn't when she left the Mother of Invention to later return and break into the Project's facilities. No, this was definitely the occasion when she had kidnapped the young alien from Blue Base on Omega's prompting and took off to try to end the war.

Sound began to emanate from the crack. The alarm was blaring and she was talking to Sheila, ordering the computer to give her manual control of the ship. But here, something different happened from what she recalls—Andy the bomb had failed to properly detonate during the flight of the ship, but here there was a brilliant flash and the Pelican was blown apart, launching this apparition of her into the sky.

"What the hell?" Tex says. "That's not what happened—"

She cuts herself off as the scene continues.

Smoke cleared, or rather, Tex cleared the smoke as she fell. She remained in the pilot's seat, which she had ejected, and she pulled the parachute. "Goddammit, Omega, what happened?" the Tex of the apparition asked.

"Your weakness for that fool has ruined everything!" Omega replied. "While you were wasting time ensuring he would remain unhurt, he was planting that bomb on our ship!"

"Church wouldn't have done this," Tex replied. "Look, forget that. We need to see if the alien survives the fall and carry through with our plan."

"Your weakness for him allowed this to happen," Omega insisted.

"I don't know what this is, but it's not something I want to hear," Tex says, clenching her fists and struggling to sit up. She pushes off one of her elbows, trying to swing her legs over the side of the cot, but none of this happens—she just ineffectually scrabbles against the sheets and is forced to fall back against the pillow again.

After seeing the crack in space the day before with Ryuuzaki, Tex isn't surprised when more of them open up and show various things in the space of the next day. During Ryuuzaki's visit today, they had made a concerted effort to ignore them, even though they're so disruptive. He had brought her several gifts on this day on particular though, including some jaffa cakes and tea bags, as well as a few more library books. They kept themselves from paying attention to the visions by socializing in a more directed manner, reading her book together and eating the cakes.

Tex is doing a bit better than before and can reach over to grab the items off the side table with some effort. So after Ryuuzaki leaves, Tex reaches over and grabs another cake. Elena has been cleaning nearby all the while and Tex calls over to her.

"You want one?"

It's been good to see Tex again, to have her nearby and know that things are going to be okay for her. Elena's kept out of their hair, giving Tex and Ryuuzaki all the privacy they need and want, as she feels both would do the same for her and Nate if either one of them was to end up in Medbay for a long period of time. Being confined to a bed for this long, it can't be the most comfortable, but Tex has been making steady progress in getting better which in turn has made Elena relieved.

What's not so relieving are the cracks in space that have been unexpectedly appearing. As tempting as they are to look at, there have been some things she'd glimpsed that left her numb and wanting to stick closer to Nate than usual.

"You talking to me?" Her head peeks into the room before her body appears, a box tucked under her arm while a rag drapes over her shoulder. "Of course you are, there's no one else in."

Smiling she enters, the box set aside on a low table closest to the door.

"You're looking better. Have a good time with Ryuuzaki?"

Tex nods. "He makes me feel better," she says. She realizes this sounds a bit different from how she means it, and she's quick to add, "I mean...he helps distract me from the nonsense I have to deal with right now, and not concentrating on it seems to help a lot." She reaches out with the jaffa cake. "Here."

"What is it?"

To Elena, it looks like a spongy looking cookie with chocolate dumped on the top half. She isn't going to be rude, however, and she moves to Tex's bedside to accept the treat.

"Thanks... And hey, I'm glad he's there for you. I know what it's like to be stuck in one of these beds for a few days."

"It's called a jaffa cake. He got them in the mail."

She hands it over and waits for Elena to try it before speaking again.

"I'm glad things have worked out the way they have. I wouldn't say I'm normally lonely, but I think the only person I could have counted on to do this kind of thing for me otherwise is my roommate, and he's pretty busy himself. Not that Ryuuzaki isn't busy running the Tower, either, but he's found time to do this for me, and I appreciate it."

He's essentially the second mate on board, and that's a pretty important. Tex likes being with someone who's important on board. Not that they're...together together. Tex is really at a loss for what they are to each other, but anyway. It's nice, and considering the events that had happened recently before the crash, she's glad they connected on the planet, even if it had happened because they were being unduly influenced by the natives there.

Not something she wants to hear, or not something she wants him to hear? This has to be something from her past, an alteration of some kind of existing memory.

Then he remembers: she doesn't know what he is, or why she might want to hide certain things from him outside of their relationship or his job on the Moira, neither of which seem like they would be unduly affected by something that didn't happen this way to begin with.

Church... that's a name he remembers seeing. Once on the Tranquility, twice on the Moira. He hadn't been completely sure whether or not the one on the Moira was the same person, but if he could use various bodies, it might have been... or a relative, maybe a son. It's always necessary at times like this to remind himself that his usual assumptions about things like timelines no longer exactly apply.

No assumption really explains why she would be talking to herself in two different voices, one almost cartoonishly villainous, and in opposition to the one he's used to.

Either way, his attention has clearly been glued to what's happening in the crack, diverting to Tex once she voices her objection and tries to sit up and leave. It's like a video... it doesn't seem like it's going to cross into the room that they're in. Would that even be possible, if she's already here?

"All right. It doesn't look like we're in any danger, but would you like me to help you out anyway?"

He's not going to get any information out of her until she's less agitated, one way or another.

Edited 2016-09-26 02:47 (UTC)

Even as she prepares to respond, the vision in the crack appears to come to an end and the pulsating lights close and disappear. She's left open-mouthed and nonplussed.

"What the fuck," she mutters lowly, settling herself back into place. "What was that?"

She glances back over at him, where he stands ready to help her, and she puts her hand on the edge of the bed, close to him. She has been avoiding talking to him about Church, but maybe he'll ask. She has to be prepared for that possibility. As well as answering questions about what this scene represents, and what actually happened that day.

It doesn't look like they're going to need to leave anymore, so he settles back in his seat next to her and looks at her, frowning curiously.

"I think you'd be in a better position to answer that than I am. The scene was familiar to you?"

"The beginning was. But when the bomb blew up, that part was different. The bomb never went off, even though it was set to detonate." She had heard Andy counting down, so she knew he was meant to go off. The fact that he didn't did not change the fact that things had gone disastrously wrong from that point, however. It's just that the disaster had been different in the apparition they had seen than it had been in real life.

He nods, still frowning, then draws his knees up to his chest and wraps his arms around them.

"It seems like the middle of a much longer story. Who were you talking to? Omega."

She's mentioned Delta -- compared him to Delta, even -- and he's aware of talk between her and Washington of Alpha and Epsilon.

"He was another of the Project's AIs. He had been assigned to me as a partner."

She doesn't explain more in detail about how she had spent time and effort trying to kill him, or how she had allowed him to jump back to her—that's complex and beside the point.

"We were carrying out a plan to try to end the war when we took off in that transport, but things went sideways pretty quickly. But not the way it did in that...vision, or whatever it was."

He continues to look increasingly interested.

"A partner? You looked like you were alone."

"He was...with me. I wasn't used in the Project in the capacity of an AI, I was an Agent. The AIs were partnered with the Agents. They could be installed in our armor or through the neural ports the human agents received. But it was a mental connection, essentially. We didn't even have to speak aloud, we could just think at each other if we wanted to."

She glances over at him, wondering how he'll take this in. Certainly, it's a fascinating concept, but as Nathan Drake had pointed out, it had a certain creep factor as well. And that was without him knowing any of the details about how the AIs were created. And this was Omega, who had not been the nicest example of one of the Project's AIs to begin with.

The tear appears for Jack when he's walking down the hall, heading for the library to see if Elizabeth is around. The sharp whine and the sound of displaced air makes him freeze and that's when he notices the glowing line like a rip in movie footage. He tentatively steps closer to it and it widens out and shows a scene he never lived in this reality.

In the tear is a version of himself, one who wears anger on his face like armor as he stares down Elizabeth with a pistol in his hand. She's staring him down calmly in spite of the weapon in her face.

"Say that again!"

"I'm telling you that Atlas-"

"SHUT UP!" Gun fire rings out sharp and deafening, the shot passing just past her head in warning. "You don't know shit! You can't just go saying things like that!"

"Please, calm down. Just think about things. Isn't it strange that you ended up exactly where you were needed?" Her hands come up in an attempt to placate him. "Jack, would you kindly-"

Another gunshot rings out and then she collapses in a heap as the alternate Jack stands over her with a smoking gun. The tear closes at the same time the real Jack throws an electro-bolt through the image, leaving a singe mark on the wall. He stares at the place where the nightmare image stood and tries to understand what he just saw.

It takes 76 a few long moments to realize what he's looking at, and he doesn't announce his presence until he's sure. He's still wrapping his mind around what happened no the planet, to say nothing of whatever's going on with this. He supposes he should consider himself lucky, because if these strange windows are giving people glimpses into possible futures, he can only imagine his would be full of things he has no interest in seeing--not to mention the fact that they might instantly out him, depending on who wanders by.

So he knows he shouldn't spend too much time around them, much less with someone like Fareeha, of all people, in the event that it decides to stop showing her alternate universe and makes up one for him, instead. If that's even what's happening here. Judging from what he's seeing, perhaps it's just an indication of a scenario the target wished was the case. He knows it wouldn't have played out this way, even if she had been allowed to join.

76 is a bit too jaded even for this. There's only so much he can watch, so he speaks up.

"Dwelling on something?"

Pharah is deeply ensconced in the tear, curiosity mixed with pride and regret. She finds herself focusing on the vision, letting it engulf her senses, indulging in the little things she never got at home. Seeing herself, as old as she is now, laughing with her mother - alive, happy. It's a celebration; Overwatch has been in operation twenty five years and there's a cake and sparklers and someone just handed Jack a noisemaker.

Hearing 76 behind her startles her out of her reverie. She stiffens, then looks back, and it's a moment before she realizes she's standing in full armor and a ship far out in space with a very different life.

Absently, she reaches up to brush her cheek, over her udjat. She hadn't had it in the vision, because her mother hadn't died, and that had been her reason to get it in the first place.

"You could say that."

She's smiling, but seeing him, she tries to reign herself in. She glances down as she pulls in a breath and adjusts her posture - straight, proud, maybe a touch defiant - and looks back at him. More serious, but there's still something in her eyes; it's hope, graciousness, that she was allowed to see this possible lifetime, even if she was denied it.

"I have been researching the tears but I have not found their cause, yet."

76 does his very best not to look. He knows he's present in whatever it is she's conjuring up--can hear himself, voice unmarred by desperate mouthfuls of superheated air. It'd be too easy to look and see himself almost as old as he is now, but far less damaged, surrounded by the people he cares about but abandoned anyway, with Overwatch intact. He keeps his eyes on Fareeha instead, and doesn't allow himself a glimpse of anything more than he's already seen. The last thing he wants or needs is to hope for something impossible. He's almost angry that this tear, or whatever it is, shows such a thing in the first place, even if he knows that no progression of events would result in something like this. 76 is increasingly convinced that Overwatch was built to fail.

So he resents Fareeha's naïveté, standing here and buying into this, even though the more logical part of him knows that it's not her fault. Who wouldn't find comfort in something like this, improbable as it is? But the more logical part of him wins out less and less, these days.

He has to tread carefully--can't sound like he knows too much.

"How have you been researching?"

76 can't even begin to explain why this is happening, or what this even is. He wouldn't know where to start.

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[Plot] What Could Have Been

Elizabeth

25th

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Agent Texas | Closed to Ryuuzaki

Pharah | OTA

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Agent Texas | Closed to Elena

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Jack

good end

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