thisavrou_log | A Spacemas Carol: December's Mod Event Log

A Spacemas Carol: December's Mod Event Log

Who: Anyone and Everyone
When: December 19 onwards
Where: Avagi... and beyond?
What: Your past, someone's present, and potential futures.
Warnings: Body horror and an associated image in the second part. Otherwise, label your content.

While the Ingress may have been destroyed, the energy powering it remains alive and well. The residents of Avagi know this intimately: from their own arrivals, from the portals that have appeared, and the short-lived changes (as well as longer-lived possessions) that have cluttered the station over the last few months. Recently, whatever force is manipulating this has even gone so far as to revive the dead—demonstrating, perhaps, an unwillingness to relinquish those it has brought to this place.

To say this entity is seasonal would probably be a mistake. In the heart of Avagi's storms, there are no stars to mark the seasons, much less connect them to a certain planet's holidays—or the literature thereon. Still, from luck or from intention, the current fluctuations comes with a certain theme...

Past

It starts at the turn of the station clock's midnight. Flickers at the edge of one's vision. Indistinct whispers, ghosting through walls and down corridors. Those who are sleeping will be untroubled, but the wakeful and wary can watch the light build: from flickers to pulses, from pulses to pools. Over several hours, silver mist fills rooms and corridors, varying from a thin veil to dense, obscuring fog. If you step into the mist, you'll feel a sense of displacement; of sound and color, energy and a shift of life. Ingress travel.

Except... not quite.

Shortly after entering the mist, you'll find yourself free of disorientation and apparently free of physical form, unable to interact with your surroundings. As a quasi-ghost, you've been transported to somewhere and somewhen—a location from the past, back on a world of someone’s origin or from any place you've been since first arriving through the Ingress. While these experiences can vary wildly, some things remain consistent:

The past matters: These visits to the past are not repeats of idle afternoons—each has emotional significance to someone currently on Avagi.
The past cannot be changed: As real as any given scenario seems, you're fundamentally incapable of altering it. The past event will play out as it did in real life and dissipate when it reaches an ending.
Trying has consequences: Attempting too hard to interfere increases the emotional significance, and will consequently draw onlookers further into the scene. You may find yourself anchored to any participant in the scene: first physically (experiencing the scene through their eyes) and then emotionally (experiencing their emotions and thoughts). If drawn in too deeply, you may lose track of your own nature during the experience, drowning in the sense of being someone else..
You are not alone: While immersed in a scene, you'll see nothing but the history playing out. However, at the its conclusion, the fog will once again displace the world around. As it melts away, you'll find themselves back in Avagi's halls—and face to face with whoever else was also viewing that piece of the past.

Present

Whether through one memory or several, eventually, the fog disperses. Only a faint mist remains, gathered in corners of the station's halls. It's simple enough to avoid, and nothing obstructs efforts to return to your rooms, your friends, or any other destination. Nothing, that is, except finding them.

The layout of the halls has shifted. The clutter you so painstakingly cleared is back. The GPS on your ACE mistakenly reports that you are floating off in space far outside the station, and any efforts to locate or call your companions results in glitchy static. Something is interfering with your calls—more effectively than the distance between worlds.

Inference and intuition are all you have to put together the pieces. The layout has changed, but the construction stayed the same. You're still on the former Ingress station. But not the same area that you called home. This is a different section of Avagi.

An inhabited one.

Dank, warm air pulses in and out of the vents in odd rhythms. Water damage stains the walls, and some seep dark liquid. There's an odd symphony in the distance: four notes, hummed to a pattern that buzzes in the back of your head. It's possible to wait it out. But if you do explore, you might come across your friends. And together, you might find the source.

Further in, a wall of flesh fills the pathways, rising and falling with intermittent, massive draws of air. A fluid wash of features glues it to the bulkheads. Claws and eyes, hands and faces: half-made bodies shifting in and out of recognition with each pulse of breath. And always with the same gold glow beneath the skin. It's a familiar shade, to those who witnessed Thisavrou's destruction.

It's the being who destroyed it.

Those who flee will escape her notice. Those who wait may watch in secret for a time. Mother's focus seems to be elsewhere...or, perhaps, something else is hiding your presence here from her.

Any attack on Mother's flesh shape, or any overt effort to draw her attention, will meet violent, immediate reprisal. You'll experience an immobilizing psychic force before the flesh consumes you. But whether you hide or fight or run, your time on this section of the station will end in the same way: a burst of brilliant, clear light providing transport back home.

Future

You flash back to reality amidst a burst of light—but this time, you recognize your surroundings. You have returned to the Avagi you know, and the silver mist that filled the halls has cleared.

Over the next few days, most of Avagi will settle back into a state of normalcy. The ACEs are working properly, and station residents will have all the time they need to compare notes on their experiences—and, perhaps, on any plans to act on what they've learned.

Avagi is not as empty as it seemed. And one place in particular will remain changed in the wake of the event. The Ingress Memorial, once inactive, has come to life, emitting a swirl of silver light that shifts and flickers, like the light of the portal it once contained. For the next five days, it will offer a vision to anyone approaching it: a single, brief scene from their potential future.

Players have the following options:

Canon future: Your character catches a glimpse of their future if they were to return from Avagi to their own world. This consists of a canon event.
Avagi future: Your character catches a glimpse of their own future on Avagi. This can be a short-term future (i.e. an actual vision of a future scene you plan to play out), or a potential longer-term one in which they stayed on Avagi for months or years.
Storm future: Your character catches a glimpse of themselves as a Mirtos—a desiccated husk and incarnation of the storm's hunger. As seen in Thisavrou's destruction, these creatures are carried by the storms and destroy all they come across.

The visions can observed by any present when the Memorial is approached. And while the past is fixed, the future is always capable of being altered. What will you do regarding yours?

[OOC: Check out the OOC post for more information!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I dunno about that. Given all the maps and info we were able to pull up from the computers, there's obviously other sectors than what we've got access to. We can't even be sure as to just how big this station is...

Not that I'm all too happy with finding out we have an unwanted neighbor potentially behind a sealed door.

[He's perfectly content to write this off as Ingress nonsense, but that doesn't solve the problem of whether or not Mother knows of their location.]

She can't be here. She would have destroyed us by now.

[Though she has been known for playing the long game.]

But if she knows where we are, that's bad news too.

Technically she didn't care too much about us. We weren't the focus of her vengeance.

[Oh, wait. Most of the team was out of commission by the time she made that little speech, huh.]

...not that I'd put it past her to be upset if she found out we're still alive and kickin' either, I'll grant you that.

[He glances warily back down the corridors.]

So what do we do? The last time we tangled with her didn't go all that well.

The Ingress complex was.

[Which they're stranded on now, even though it's been hundreds of years. 76 frowns, considering their (admittedly limited) courses of action.]

Find a way out. Preferably without her realizing we're here.

Actually, the ones running it were. The complex, or rather the Ingress, was just a convenient way for her to inflict her wrath. We were just unfortunate collateral.

...wonder if the outcome surprised her as much as it did us. I'm not sure if she meant to go out with a bang and take everyone with her, but um.

[He shrugs, gesturing loosely around them.]

Yeah. Good plan. Maybe we can find a hatch or something that'll take us back to our end of the station.

I don't know if it made a difference, in the end. I think she knew exactly what she was doing.

[But it's pointless to argue the semantics of what, exactly went down, not when there's a much more pressing matter that they should take care of. Escaping is the priority, though of course 76 isn't quite sure where to start.]

Just pick a direction, I guess. This way.

Nah, not really. We're still here in one piece, at least.

...hopefully we can keep things that way.

[A glance at his Ghost gains a shrug from the floating AI. Wherever they are in the station, it's far enough from any of the known areas already mapped out that it can't make a quick connection for the nearest routes with a routine scan.

So picking one direction's as good as any. Nodding, Cayde follows after 76, keeping his gun up and ready.]

For now.

[Ever the pessimist, but he knows Cayde is fully on board. The problem is that everything looks the same, and there's no real well to tell whether or not they're going towards or away the center of the problem. Picking a direction and walking is not his best plan, but what else can they do, when they're looking for a way out?]

Let's just hope this is the right way.

You're a reeeal ball of sunshine.

[The Exo smirks a bit at the old Soldier, but he's definitely glad that if there's any company to be had in this creepy area, it's with someone who's armed and, well, just as paranoid about this place as he is.

The Ghost flies into Cayde, vanishing in a brief shimmer of light where the Guardian won't have to worry about his small counterpart if things go horribly south.]

If it isn't, it'll be a short trip.

Just being realistic.

[And he's pretty sure Cayde isn't complaining about the company. They've been through enough situations like this by now--and been through them together--to know not to be optimistic. He's got his doubts about all this, and he's not going to be shy about voicing them.

76 frowns, running his hand along the wall, idly wondering if she'll be able to detect their presence that way.]

It looks like its getting worse down that way.

[More accumulation, he means. They're offered a choice--continue deeper, or turn back while they have the chance.]

[Cayde finds it strange that they haven't already been detected as it is.

He squints down the hall, and if he had a nose, he'd be wrinkling it.]

Doesn't get any better going the way we'd come from. Guess we should've figured this won't be easy. Think we may as well do some recon while we try finding a way through this?

Deeper it is.

[Even if it's most certainly going to get them into more trouble. They unleashed Mother on everyone once, and 76 is of course loath to let that happen again, but Cayde is right that they need to get to the bottom of this.]

[So far as Cayde's concerned, the moment they found themselves in this area, they were in trouble. May as well have something to show for it. ...if they can get out of it alive.

It doesn't get any better, but that's to be expected when you have pulsating, shifting flesh for wallpaper.]

Someone needs a new interior decorator...

[In and out, breathing. It just isn't right. But...at least it seems that none of their surroundings have seemed to take notice of them. So far.]

[It's a big if, all things considered, and 76 goes into this fully aware that they might alert Mother not only to their presence, but the presence of everyone on Avagi. Reward, however, is not without risk, and all he can hope is that he and Cayde are fast and skilled enough to get in and get out as quickly as possible, without detection.

So he pushes down the corridors, following the accumulation of flesh, trying to bite down his own survival instincts. It isn't long until they seem to be reaching the center of it, and then--]

There.

[Unmistakably Mother, thankfully occupied. 76 isn't sure how long that will last, and his voice is a low hiss.]

What's she doing?

[What Cayde doesn't get is why, if the Mother's been here all this time, has she not already known that they were all here? But then there's a lot of things they don't know in general. Had she been transported by the Ingress energies with them? Had she just laid low on this floating pseudo-rock for centuries because there was nowhere else to go?

The oozy flesh surroundings have been so much of a bother to him because he's seen the like of it before, and while it's not pleasant, it helps a little not to have a human stomach to get unsettled.

When 76 speaks up again, Cayde looks ahead, optics hooding in a narrow-eyed expression. He shakes his head, more so for the weird sensation that's been humming in the back of his mind. It's gotten stronger, and he's not too sure he likes the implications.]

...no idea. Not sure either way if it's good or not.

[He speaks back quietly, his attention still fixed upon golden-skinned mass that's nearly overtaken the place.]

She might not even be here, not really.

[It wouldn't be the first time they were subject to mass hallucination. It's difficult to tell whether any of this is happening at all--if she's real, or if they are. There's no way to determine when any of this is happening, either, leaving him at more of a loss.]

No way to know for sure.

Well, we could try shooting her to see if she reacts.

[Because that's usually a good way to get a reaction of one sort or another.]

Are you crazy?

[He hisses it sharply, casting a glance over to Mother, as if trying to make sure she's still oblivious to their presence.]

You want her to know we're here?

[Of course, this is all contingent on whether or not this is happening at all.]

[Cayde just gives him this look implying the roundabout uncertainty of the whole matter.]

Anyway, it was just a suggestion. I think that feedback's getting to me. Also? It'd probably take nothing short of blowing up this part of the station to take her out, and I don't have that firepower right now.

See if we can't get her attention some other way.

[Then they can determine who's really here and who's not.]

[Considering this, Cayde glances around at the flesh-slicked walls.]

Gotta be some circuitry running through around here, maybe my Ghost can isolate the power or cause a hiccup down the line, see if that works.

[He holds his hand out, the Ghost appearing in a shimmer.]

You sure you want to do this?

Not really, but that's all I got.

[Both glance to 76 to see if he's on board with it.]

It's not too late to turn back.

[But he knows they're both curious enough to try it, and 76 seems confident that they can pull it off with Ghost's help. It will, at the very least, given them a definitive answer as to whether any of this is real or not.

He offers an affirmative nod.]

All yours.

[The Ghost nods back before swiveling about, eyeing the wall. With a sigh, it then plunges right through it, vanishing just as it had with Cayde.

Cayde watches anxiously. It's not long before there's a dim flickering of lights further down the intersecting hall from their's, at least what can be seen between the gobs of flesh.]

[Mother's attention still seems to be on whatever she's doing, but 76 is ready to hit the ground running just in case. All they're really trying to do is determine whether or not they're even on the same plane of existence as she is, so hopefully they can do it without giving away their location, in the event they are actually here.

His fingers curl tighter around his gun, watching intently for any kind of signal.]

[The more he thinks about it, the harder Cayde feels they can justify that anything they gather here through interaction or observation. It's not a pleasant thing to think about, and a fresh reminder at how upsetting and messed up it is to ever have been subjected to something that now makes you question the reality of everything. Nearly makes a person want to just carelessly shoot everything just for the sake of a reaction of some kind.

He stays his hand, more intent on his Ghost's safety, because real or hallucination, that's definitely not something he's taking a risk on.

...although now that he thinks about it, if they could find a console, maybe they could have gotten his Ghost to pull up a map. Not...that the Mother was making anything easy to find. Disrupting circuitry seems about the simplest thing to manage.

The walls continue to shift in their disturbing way, or is it moving slower? Cayde can't tell, but his eyes flick towards it, and then back towards the distant trouble light as it flickers erratically. And then it goes completely out.

What happens next may as well be simultaneous for how quickly things surge into motion. Cayde's Ghost emerges abruptly, practically scooped out of midair out of reflex, betraying how anxious the Hunter had gotten to have his Ghost out of sight in potentially hostile territory. He's not looking down at his little companion for long, and 76 will probably have noticed what he has, if not where Cayde's turned his attention.

Around them, the walls have ceased to shift as though Someone's become suddenly focused. Very focused.]

A Spacemas Carol: December's Mod Event Log

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This okay?

yaes

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