Entry tags:

August Event Log: Part I

Who: Everyone
When: August 9 and onward
Where: An unexpected destination
What: The newcomers go on a trip and end up far from where they expected
Warnings: Potential violence. Please label your content!

NOTE: PLEASE READ THIS OOC POST FIRST.

When the time comes for the travelers to go on the off-world trip that will help restore Thisavrou, they are not alone. Others who have settled on the planets longer and come to call them home are also prepared to travel; through the Ingress and do their part. Yet when the newcomers step through, whether they stepped through the Ingress seconds or hours apart, they will find that they have arrived at the same time, and only newcomers are in sight.

What awaits them is not a land of plenty. The land is barren, and dark storms in the sky resemble those held at bay by the Ingress complex—but much, much closer. Those who traveled on the Moira may recognize the landscape; though they have come through at a different point from the crash, they are on the Midway Hub. And there is no portal back. They are trapped.

hitting the road

Though some have been here before, the Midway Hub is not as they remember it. The storms fill the sky, leaving it dark and ominous even when they are not sweeping across the landscape—but they have clearly done so in recent times, and often. While never a lush land, large patches of ground an acre or more wide looking nothing more than utterly dead; the thistle that naturally grows is brittle, black and unable to be consumed even with the usual preparations to make it edible, and here and there animal corpses are found twisted into unnatural poses, but seemingly uninjured. These places are particularly concentrated near the broken Ingresses litter the landscape. While Midway Hub as a whole may seem naturally arid, these dead spots leave no hope that anything can possibly live there again.

The travelers have two options: stay where they are, or move on. While it might seem that they've been tricked into coming here and been left abandoned, those with the technological ability to do so may detect a sign of hope: a familiar energy source, far in the distance. Although none of the Ingresses they pass will ever work again, the faint energy shows that one still-functioning Ingress lies far in the distance, days away.

Although technological scanning or impressive memory of the landscape indicates that they are not separated from their destination by one of the gates that divide the land, they are also far from the shelter of the facility at the center of the Hub. Any attempt to travel in a direction other than that of the energy signal will result in a strange disorientation after several hours, bringing individuals back to their original path as though they've gone in circles. Meanwhile, though travelers will feel the need to slake their hunger and thirst through any natural water sources they discover, wildlife they can hunt for food and any supplies they have on them, if they don't find sustenance, they'll find that they will never pass out or reach the point of starvation. Instead, they'll be left alive and awake but feeling utterly hollow.

storm front

At regular intervals, the energy storms above descend onto the land, bringing not rain but violent clashes of negative energy and thunder so loud that nothing can be heard above it. The passing of the storms leaves some strange effects. The ground is warped and rotted by their touch, even solid stone degrading to a spongy surface. The air is tepid and oddly charged. Prolonged contact with air or ground will not supply energy, however — it drains it from organic and synthetic life alike.

Those who remember their last trip to the Hub, or simply explore in the right direction, may come across the cave complexes with their glowing surfaces and streams. The light is dimmer now, a sickly green, but drinking from the streams will still restore the energy lost, for a time. This time, however, the lethargy that inevitably follows is much more severe, and the drinkers are left with a raw, empty feeling leeching in from the wasteland around.

Those who are exposed to the storms, either by finding themselves in very close proximity or even closely observing them for too long as they approach, may lose their sight, or hearing, even much of the ability to feel touch — whatever sense they used in observation. What lingers in its place is a numbness. A hunger. And as time passes, the time between storms decreases; what seemed like hours between the storms becomes scarcely one, and their intensity grows.

wild life

Sentient beings are not the only ones affected by the storms; these creatures, attracted to sound and able to track by scent, and these panthers, which once looked normal but have been twisted by the storms into more monstrous forms, are numerous enough that travelers must be constantly alert for their presence. Though natural predators, the threat the creatures represent is not itself natural. They are also more aggressive. Some strange instinct drives them, not a need for food. While the panthers themselves can be caught and their meat cooked, it has little taste, offering nutrition but not satisfaction.

old familiar places

Although it's difficult to track the passage of time without day-night cycles, after what seems like more than a week of the travelers' unexpected trip, the storms abruptly come rushing in at the group of travelers, as if they're herding the group to move faster toward their destination and the Ingress energy that awaits them. The true nature of that destination becomes clear when debris appears on the horizon; the energy comes from the wreckage of the Moira, the interstellar ship that crashed here months ago.

Despite the trauma of impact, large sections of the ship remain surprisingly intact, though few of them are properly vertically oriented. If travelers are able to make their way inside the damaged sections of the ship, they'll find familiar territory, if they are one of those who traveled on the Moira, as well as shelter—something that's increasingly necessary as the storms seem to center over the ship, leaving little hope for survival outside. Useful items may be scavenged from the ship if they are willing to explore, but no personal items of any kind remain.

Strangely, the deeper travelers go into the crashed ship, the less familiar their surroundings will seem, regardless of their orientation. The inward-leading paths into the ship become generic metal, and as with the travel on the surface of the planet, they may find themselves back where they started. And no matter how far they go or how hard they try, they will find themselves unable to make it to the Ingress chamber itself...for now.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

( hitting the road )

( Ana's heard enough about the Midway Hub that it doesn't take her long to guess that this is where they've been brought. She's also not too surprised,
given her failing trust in the Savrii. Gathering everyone together and sending them all out... it smelled like a trap if there ever was one, and it would have taken less for Ana to leave without her supply pack.

Though she entered the Ingress with Jack arriving in the crowd of people has them scattered, and starts her on searching for him and her other familiar faces.
If she knows you then Ana might just check in, make sure that you're okay.
They've got a bleak outlook ahead.

Though Ana has food in her pack she's still checking the plant life, seeing if any of it is edible or can be used for something. She's not so skilled in the latter,
though the sight of it alone makes her doubt that it would be good to eat.
It still doesn't stop her from checking every so often as they walk -- just in case.
It looks like a long road out, and they'll need something to eat. All of them )

( wildlife )

( She's near her camp when she hears the sound, head turning from where she was stood to try and follow the noise. Her rifle had been left with Jack as she'd gone to deliver food to someone nearby, though she still had her sidearm on her )

Did you hear that?

( She's checking that it's not just her, not with the people moving around and noises from the storms. Ana passes the small parcel over, just a ration, but needed )

( closed to jack )

( It had started as they'd been walking, things feeling a little quieter, Ana missing Jack's approaching footsteps until he'd had to get her attention by touch.

Now it's gone, completely. For the past day Ana hadn't heard a single sound --
Jack, her own voice. It left her feeling vulnerable to what was around her,
and frankly a little lost. Sure she could still communicate -- she'd needed to use other methods back in the day before, but Ana had never had to rely on them so heavily. She valued her senses, and how they'd kept her alive, now--

There's a quick tap tap. I. Then Ana pauses. It was easy falling back into old routines -- sleep shifts, brief conversations on the task at hand. A solid shift from the days previously where they'd simply been together, relieved that they hadn't lost the other.

Part of it is refreshing. Missions always were easy with the two of them, and they needed to say little to get the job done, simply knowing what to do and what the other needed. It's when you can't speak that trying to becomes hardest.

Ana taps again. It's getting late. Her watch was first. That was one thing that she'd been adamant about, still doing her duty. It was more dangerous without her hearing but she'd been able to set up some other warnings, she could still see; patrol. She couldn't stop, couldn't give in )

"Hear what?" Mei takes the package and carefully tucks it into one of the many pockets inside her parka before unclipping her blaster from her belt. "Thank you for that." Meaning the rations. She'll dig into it later, once she's sure it's safe. Ana wouldn't be bringing up hearing a noise unless she thought it might be something worth investigating, so Mei listens closely to their surroundings, waiting to see if her ears do pick something up this time.

[ ooc: let me know if switching to prose is okay? it's easier on my eyes when there are longer paragraphs of text, but i can zoom in on the page if you prefer brackets. ]

Ana's attention is already on the noise, eye searching out into the distance to see if she could find what it was.

"An animal, perhaps." Which wouldn't be good. The state of things out here--

Her gaze stays off for a few more seconds before she looks back down to Mei. They would at least be prepared now.

"We'll be safer here."

"Yeah, safety in numbers, right? Plus we can both hit any wild animals from a distance with our weapons." It's still a little nerve-wracking to know they're out there and perhaps watching them at camp too. It's always bad when something can see you and you can't see it.

"Have you seen the panthers? Or panther like things, whatever they are. They look scary."

"I saw them." Though she adds no comment as to how scary she may or may not have found them. She's seen a lot in her life, too much depending on the day.

"Though numbers are advantageous." She finishes her scan before moving to take a seat, keeping her rifle close and alert.

"Hopefully none have come this close so far."

With Ana's confidence in taking a seat for now, Mei follows, sitting beside her and looking out into the night.

"I think if they had, we would have heard about it." She fiddles with the settings on her gun for a moment before setting in back on her utility belt. There's a pause, as she really doesn't know what else to say. Ana had always felt more warm, more approachable than Jack, yet at the same time it was clear she was a soldier and you weren't to waste her time.

After a bit of hesitation, she speaks. "It's good to see you again. I had a lot of information to catch up on, but I'd read you died. People should know better than to assume that when we disappear, right? Me, you, Jack." Probably others too. They're hard to kill.

She gives a nod, agreeing with Mei's assessment. If the animals had gotten closer someone would have said something... or screamed.

And then she smiles. Mei's thought is kind, though there's also an added part to it -- a part that, although people should know better than to assume that she was dead that it had been what Ana had wanted them to think.

"They should, though this time they were right to." It was a story that she'd yet to tell Mei, and she didn't know exactly how much the woman knew or had had time to catch up on. "It was several years before I resurfaced, and not as myself."

Or to anyone that had known her.

hitting the road

storm front

wild life

old familiar places

ana amari ( open )

{ wildlife }

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( hitting the road )

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