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.

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He'd been by her apartment three times in the last two user-weeks. The first two, Yori had been out. The third, resting. Rinzler had hesitated outside the door for long micros before moving on. He'd run into her eventually. She didn't need to know now.

This wasn't where Rinzler had expected. Certainly, it wasn't how. His own scans of the clouds had been staggering in their silence: not the surge and crackle of life-giving power pushed to an extreme, but an aching drain of energy raw and painful just to read. He doesn't notice the empty echo it leaves in his perceptions when he turns away.

Not until he finds the blue-lit body slumped across the ground. Not until he tries to sense her, tries to check—and reads nothing, functions returning null null {} all around.

"Yori—!"

Harsh and panicked isn't the tone Rinzler had intended for his first words to Yori since acquiring his voice. It's certainly what she'll be hearing, though—along with some very rapid steps.

The fall didn't hurt. Yori's not certain whether to trust that as evidence. For all she knows this might be some kind of cascading failure, though inexplicable weirdness always has a high and irritating chance of truth.

She'd rather not panic. She'll just lie still long enough to get the hang of her own reactions and make sure there's no actual damage, in order not to make things worse.

But she's only partway through an annoyed survey of her fingers and toes when the sharp cry disrupts her plan.

Yori remembers Rinzler's voice; remembers her name, the first time she saw him, strained out against the sharp chains of binding code.

This cry is louder but similar enough she marks it as Rinzler, not Tron—and moves even before the comparison returns, instant reaction to that tone from either of the security programs she trusts most. She can't feel her feet very well, but she can roll to her knees, wary of threats, trying hard to be ready to dodge.

Nothing visible except the usual confusion of fellow travelers, in the medium distance.

"What's wrong?" she calls, all too well aware that she doesn't know what this numb empty hunger in her core looks like to Security. What could possibly make Rinzler shout like that? Nothing good.

Yori sits up. A little unevenly, quick roll to kneel, eyes flitting fast and sure through the periphery. Yori sits up, but she's still not there, and Rinzler stutters to a stop just steps away, visuals locked on her clear lights.

She's fine. She isn't. This is wrong; he's wrong, he—

"Couldn't—"

Vocals. Yes. Rinzler lowers his hands—both the one half-raised forward, and the one that twitched, bewildered, toward his TAB. He tries again, voice clearer, if still harsh and taut with tension.

"Can't read you."

He can't sense her at all? That explains his panic. Yori's not sure whether she can give any comfort. She's not even sure she can stand up without falling.

"I can't read myself very well either, right now," she admits, because it might be relevant, even though it's not in the least reassuring. "I don't know why."

Wait.

"We haven't turned human again, have we?" It was far from a good experience the first time. Yori scowls at her own wrist, sliding her sleeve and armor aside to check that circuits exist. They look normal and report nothing at all about being prodded. That doesn't fit the pattern she remembers from Inugami.

And that's three spoken phrases in a row from Rinzler, she notes, which even shock had never pushed him into that she knew of. Being human hadn't let him do that before. Something else? It's probably not the most urgent question in the current queue, but she's determined to get an answer at some point.

He can't read her. She can't read herself. Fingers curl at his side, but Rinzler holds position, and after a moment, reaches back. His own disk feels normal, both synced and in his hand. A thought, and the weapon lights, reassuring hum of power in his grip. Rinzler hesitates, and then extinguishes the blade. The more conclusive test is obvious, but when it would require reporting to Clu regardless of results... better to let his admin decide if it proves necessary.

Besides, he doubts Yori would approve.

"Still code." The phrase chases with a slight catch, uncertainty half-swallowed. Still, Rinzler's mostly sure. He certainly doesn't feel as damaged as before—or even as bad as last time, with the power leech this place effected.

Possibly relevant.

"Energy levels?" The opaque helmet slants.

The active disk is strong enough evidence for Yori to accept, some fraction of her worry dissipating. Rinzler's not too much altered. It's hard to answer with equal certainty for her own well-hidden disk. She rests her weight back on her heels and digs behind her neck for the catch in the armor that fits over it. Her fingers close on nothing, clumsy.

"I tried to charge, but I can't tell." Yori stares at her active circuitry in acute frustration. How is it even possible to have energy and not feel it? "My hands and feet look fine, but if I'm not looking at them I can hardly prove they exist."

The armor gives way after a moment; she'd tried hard to work out quick access to her disk in an emergency, but she had expected her fingers to behave themselves better than this.

She doesn't draw it, afraid now of dropping it or something worse, but she turns far enough to let Rinzler see and watches over her own shoulder as she orders a pingback. The disk lights briefly, a dim pulse.

"I can't feel that either," she admits in dismay, "even though it seems functional. This damage doesn't make any sense."

That's not new, frustratingly opaque circumstances have turned up one after another, but this one is terribly personal and she can't tell yet how bad it's going to be.

Rinzler eyes the fumbling reach with some concern. That could be more hazardous than any of the other glitches, especially in a hostile area. He nods to the data, turns to watch the effect of the pingback. On visuals alone, it all looked fine. But Yori is erroring, and he can't sense her to tell how.

Sound rumbles out, harsh and unsettled. "Coordination?" His wasn't affected, by immediate diagnostics, at least. A fuller assessment might be required. They don't seem to be experiencing the same errors, though. Apart from Yori not registering, he isn't sure he's found any.

...

The enforcer stills. Crouches down, and reaches out off to one side. Fingers uncurl a little slower, placing his disk flat on the spongy rock before he withdraws his hand.

One beat. Two. Three moments of odd, mismatched silence, no pulse of power or raw blip of compressed code. Then Rinzler reaches back to take it.

"Scans."

Three attempts to replace her disk slide off, and she can't feel any of them properly. A careful error-corrected path succeeds the fourth. She's never had so much trouble making the simple transfer of disk into dock before.

It would bother her less if Rinzler weren't watching with such obvious worry. He'll protect her, of course, but she hates to calculate how much fear her failure is sparking.

"Everything feels off, but as far as I can tell it isn't getting any worse." It's a somewhat feeble attempt at reassurance. "I can adjust."

Not as fast as Rinzler would, but she'll get there.

His own experiment answers the second question, why he can't feel her either. That implies they've each lost an important sense. The power drain last time wasn't like this, but it's a close enough precedent that she can accept the theory.

No immediate threat, just more remarkably ill-timed chaos.

Cautious, she pushes herself to one knee and holds out her hand. "Help me stand?" Maybe he'll feel better if he can tell she still exists with the senses that do work. She might feel better too.

Yori can adjust. Yori shouldn't have to. And any reassurance offered by her words falls somewhat short when his own assessments are still returning a flat null. Rinzler's grip locks a little tighter around his disk as his frame draws in: useless seething with no fault in sight.

The request provides at least some slight modicum of purpose. Rinzler's helmet dips as he steps forward, a reach behind to dock his disk as his other hand extends to Yori's. Touch-contact at least seems to register, and the angry lock to his shoulders fades a little at the feel of her signature, bright and clear against his own. No way to diagnose. Nothing to do.

But she's still there. He lifts, carefully steadying.

With Rinzler's help, it's much easier to get balanced on her reluctant feet. "Thank you," she says, keeping the grip on his hand. Contact definitely improves her mood, even if she can't feel much right now.

Now that the urgent questions of continuing existence are as well answered as they're going to get anytime soon, Yori can go back to the other one she's very curious about.

"It's nice to hear you," she tells him first, because his long-stifled voice is not a thing she wants to invite misunderstandings over. "Has something changed?"

Phrased that way she feels a little silly even asking, but any query more specific is treading on uncomfortable territory. Rinzler can tell her what he wants to and not more.

Just a little silly, yes. Rinzler stares a moment before sound skips with a staticky huff. Which he can make, apparently! ~~Give him long enough and he might learn to laugh at people properly.~~

Still, he doesn't seem bothered. And he won't be letting go of Yori's hand anytime soon.

"Edit. Permissions upgrade."

Not said (because why would he need to?): from Clu.

Yori lets out a soft chuckle of her own at that amused noise. It's remarkably good to hear Rinzler happy, even under these circumstances. Especially under these circumstances.

If he's not trying to hide the fact or worrying over Clu's reaction to it, Yori is pretty sure that means a permissions upgrade from the only one who's ever objected to his having a voice in the first place. Clu let Rinzler talk again.

She needs to ponder the implications of that, but not now. Right now she doesn't need any new worries.

Her fingers are still numb, but she gives them some practice, attempting a gentle squeeze of Rinzler's hand. "Obvious, I know. But it's a good thing when you're going to have your hands so full with this mess."

She has no doubt Rinzler will be trying to protect everyone, within limits, and everyone is going to be difficult about it somehow.

"What do you have in energy reserves, can you tell?" She'd like to hear him talk a bit more.

(And remind herself that this is Rinzler's voice now, not Tron's. The syntax is different, the tones are all different, it shouldn't be hard...except in the ways it will always be hard.)

The squeeze is welcome. And, after a moment, carefully returned. No way to tell how much Yori can feel, but she's here. He is, too.

Rinzler's grateful for that.

The helmet angles a little. Apart from not detecting the damage to his scans, internal diagnostics seem to be functioning just fine. (Not that he would know if they weren't.)

"Fifty-eight percent," he rumbles out eventually. Just over half capacity. He'd charged not long before leaving, but not since, and something about this place seems to be sapping power—differently than before. Still, so long as Rinzler can still activate his disks, he thinks that part might count as an improvement for himself.

Clu's enforcer was made to work on minimal intake.

Pressure with no accompanying warmth of energy is going to take some getting used to. At least she can tell Rinzler is as relieved she's functioning as she is, a warmth of its own.

Fifty-eight percent: not bad, for Rinzler. He's got more capacity to work with than her shallow pool, incalculable as it seems right now. Even so, less than sixty percent... "Do you want to charge from my batteries?" she asks.

If they don't find more power sources, her hoarded reserve won't last forever. But Rinzler's the one on active defense. Yori doesn't think he'll take her up on the offer, since she isn't going to make him this time. All the more reason she definitely wants him to know he's welcome to her supply if he needs it.

She's going to have to charge every few hours, just a little, since she can't even tell whether she's running low or critically high. Can't risk either. She dislikes this place more and more. Small packets are not an efficient use of either her time or her battery power.

Yori sighs and steps a little closer to Rinzler, so she can at least hold his hand in both of hers. "I didn't mean to startle you. It really is good to see you." He'll have important tasks to do shortly, no doubt. If he keeps letting her see him when he's close enough, that's something.

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August Event Log: Part I

hitting the road

storm front

wild life

old familiar places

storm front: a

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