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

[ Walking through the Ingress without a fully body suit of armor is just about unfathomable to Tony, so honestly, York has the right idea.

Tony's open faceplate means York can see the quirked eyebrow as he looks over. More armor? It looks like the rig Tex has, not to mention that other guy her shadow was trying to murder. There must be a secret club he wasn't invited to. ]

Aw, c'mon, this went so well last time. [ Simultaneously dripping with sarcasm and drier than the Sahara. Somehow. ] It's just like a vacation where everything tries to kill you, and there's no minibar.

[ York is similarly sizing up Tony's armor behind his helmet -- his faceplate doesn't open, though, so his curiosity is hidden. ]

That kinda vacation is my life. But at least last time we had resources from the ship. This time it's just whatever we've got in our pac discs, if people even keep theirs on them and stocked like I do.

[ He tilts his head a little at Tony, and that much is obvious. ] You military?

[ Tony snorts at the suggestion, thinking of Cap's bright and spangly tights, or the military's attempts to pluck the armor away from him. ]

No, thank God. But your implied over-preparedness and weapons-grade rig makes me think I'm the only one.

[ It might explain a thing or two about why multiple people seem to be similarly well-equipped. Just one could be an enthusiastic hobbyist, two is Very Best Friends, but three is just plain unlikely. ]

[ There's six of them at this point, actually. Six incredibly well armed folks in power armor, though no one's is as fancily outfitted as Tony's. ]

We were... a special program. You built this yourself, then? Impressive. [ He doesn't bother using the present tense just for Maine's sake, as the rest of them are out of Freelancer. He does, however, take a few steps forward to more closely examine Tony's armor, and when he does a glowing green figure appears at his shoulder. ]

York, it may be unwise to approach.

Relax, D, we're all friendly here. Right, man?

[ A British voice pipes up as soon as the green figure appears, like JARVIS chose that moment to speak specifically because he was afraid of being left out of a party. ]

There is no cause for concern, sir.

[ The corner of Tony's mouth quirks, like he's fighting back the urge to laugh at the situation. ]

Yeah, hell, why not? We're all on this shitty camping trip together, the more the merrier.

[ He has no problems letting York ogle; the armor is the second love of his life, after all. Any and all appreciation it gets is well deserved, in his opinion. He'll even turn and move so that York can get a better look at how panels, seams, and hydraulics work. ]

I gotta ask, though, it wouldn't be the first time - is there anything organic under all that armor?

[ Tony's armor is better. There's no questioning that, the panels cover him completely whereas York's has gaps where the plates meet so he can move. He's a little jealous, actually, and wonders what it's made of, how it's put together and how Tony gets into it.

He reels back a little at the British voice popping up from nowhere. ]

You've got an AI too?

I'm organic. Just human under here, with a little circuitry for Delta to hang out in.

JARVIS, sir. A pleasure.

[ The voice is prompt to respond to York's question, though Tony ignores it in favor of what he's immediately deemed more interesting. Something about the wording York used... ]

Hang on - you've got your AI inside you?

JARVIS? Nice to meet you... you don't have a projection for me to look at?

[ He's looking Tony up and down, as if the hologram is going to pop out from behind his armored form. And then he blinks at the question. ]

Yeah, he's jacked straight into my brain. I'll show you. [ York pulls his helmet off and turns his head so Tony can see the base of his neural implant. ] Where's JARVIS?

I have no pre-determined physical form, though I can produce one with the appropriate hardware.

[ Tony had always made do giving his AI a voice alone - a physical projection had never seriously occurred to him before, but his time here is making him think he might be an oddity in that regard. He leans forward to examine the implant, suddenly wishing he had his helmet on so that he could scan the thing.

Would that be creepy? Whatever, he'll refrain. ]

JARVIS is in here. [ He taps the armor's chest, his eyes not shifting from their curious scrutiny of York's cyborg aesthetic. ] And in the TAB, and basically anything else that runs on electricity. This is the first time I've ever felt old-fashioned, though.

Interesting. So you get to choose what you look like? D here's stuck in his armor... I wonder what his face would be, sometimes.

[ Scanning the implant would indeed be kinda creepy, but York lets Tony get a good look at it at least. Then he's back to admiring Tony's armor. ]

You built all this, and him, yourself?

August Event Log: Part I

hitting the road

storm front

wild life

old familiar places

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sorry for the loooong delay!! moving and then a hurricane happened....

no problem at all <3

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