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

[ Tex sees the sniper headed into the cave, and right away she's concerned. It seems like an inadequate place to hide from these storms, for those who aren't protected by body armor like she is. He has some kind of helmet on, but something tells her he wouldn't be headed in there if he didn't feel he needed the cover.

So she catches up, coming alongside behind, just in time to hear him call out. ]

I'm here. Behind you.

[Body tensing, his hand instinctively flies to the pistol on his hip as soon as he hears someone behind him. Not that he can see anything to shoot at it, but hey. He visibly relaxes almost immediately, realizing that it's not just some creature that's shown up to eat him. He had just called out to see if anyone was around, after all. To be fair, suddenly going blind would probably make anyone a bit jumpy.

Anyway, he drops his hand from his sidearm, nodding in reply.]

Is it dark in here, / Or have I lost my vision? / I can't shoot like this.

[Because not being able to shoot things is totally his biggest concern right now. Probably.]

[ Her answer comes smoothly, calmly, back, as she continues her approach. ]

You shouldn't then.

[ But of course he'd been wise enough to pull his hand off of his gun. She comes closer. ]

Are you going to need me to guide you? It's not super dark in here. You should be able to at least see the cave walls.

There's nothing. I don't see anything.

[No shooting for now. Instead, he reaches up and runs his hand down his helmet's faceplate as if trying to rub something off of it. But nope, it's clean, which means he's just totally blind after all.

Suuuuuper. His shoulders sag a bit at this realization, but he still sounds pretty calm about the whole thing.]

I may be in need of assistance.

[He's absolutely in need of assistance.]

I can help.

[ She says that as reassuringly as she can, and starts forward. ]

I'm coming closer, and I'm going to touch you in a second.

Understood.

[He was kind of expecting it already, but the heads up is definitely appreciated. He was already feeling jumpy enough as it was.]

[ She approaches and puts her arm gently around his shoulder. Her armor is bulky, but it doesn't prevent her from keeping a light touch. ]

Lets go further into the cave and wait out the storm. Then we can find the camp.

[He manages to relax a bit when feels that whoever this is has on some sort of armor. A combatant of some sort, if he had to guess. He's a little relieved, not so much because he feels like he needs protection, but because he won't slow her down as much as he might someone with less experience.]

Please don't let me trip. / I would look like a dumbass, / And we can't have that.

[This lovely haiku is accompanied by a holographic frowny face :( emote popping up in front of his visor for a moment. As much as this sucks, he can still manage a little humor, at least.]

No, that's unbecoming of someone like you, isn't it?

[ Not that she knows him, but she's already getting an impression of his personality and she can tell he's got a bit of pride.

She leads him back to a cavern jutting along the side cave wall, rather than going all the way back to the back. ]

We can stay here. It's a side cavern, about three meters wide.

[He makes a soft sound, almost a chuckle. Yeah, falling on his face in a cave is completely unbecoming of him, good guess.

Despite the fact that he can't see shit, he doesn't have too much trouble keeping his footing.]

That sounds good to me. / I appreciate your help, / This could have gone worse.

[ She lets out a little hum of agreement. It definitely could have been worse. Anyway, now they have to wait things out, and that means small talk.

She's bad at small talk.

Nevertheless, she refuses to sit here in awkward silence. She looks out toward the cave entrance, watching the evidence of the storm rage by. ]

It was a good instinct, avoiding the storm in the cave. It's too bad you weren't further in when it struck.

[It's all good, Zer0 isn't the best at small talk either. It is a welcome distraction from the fact that he's kind of completely blind, though.

He feels around for a spot to sit, taking his rifle off his back before having a seat.]

It caught me off guard. / I'd climbed up somewhere to snipe, / My descent slowed me.

[He busies his hands with removing the clip from his rifle. No sense in leaving it loaded when he can't even use the damn thing. He may not be able to see what he's doing, but he knows his guns better then the back of his hand.]

[ She doesn't startle when he begins fiddling with his gun. What he's doing is fairly obvious. It's smart, too. ]

Did you hit anything?

Edited 2017-08-28 23:14 (UTC)

Plenty, with bullets. /

[That's probably not what she's talking about, though. Or maybe it is, but y'know. He takes a few seconds to make sure there aren't any bullets left in the chamber before continuing.]

When I fell, I don't think so. / Didn't land too hard.

We'll have to seek out what you shot so we can get it cooked before it starts rotting, then.

[ She was indeed asking about the former, but the latter is good to know. ]

Didn't break anything then. Sorry to say, I'm mostly glad to know that because we won't have to carry you.

[ He'll be a burden from here on out, being blind, but at least he can walk. ]

Most are fairly close. / Finding them should not be hard, / They're in the open.

[As for the rest, Zer0 can only shrug. He can absolutely see where she's coming from.]

I won't slow you down.

August Event Log: Part I

hitting the road

storm front

wild life

old familiar places

Storms

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