I
N
T
R
O
L
O
G
|
by the inquest
"Arguments on their nature are refuted by those who return to shore, wide-eyed with tales of their savagery."
All Moirans are woken to the sounds of the ship coming to a rather grating halt some time in the early morning cycle. It’s no faster or slower than any other stop, but it is unexpected as the captains didn’t mention an upcoming disembarkment. Shortly after, a message is sent to every MID:Navigation has informed us that we’re approaching bad traveling conditions: an overactive star. Instead of stopping on Liant El, we’ll be docking here on Ceta. Please exercise caution while gathering supplies and during excursions. Follow their safety guidelines. If the chance allows, we’ll also be signing new crew on the planet. Please greet them first and show them to the ship. Thank you. The Ingress has pulled you in. Your body experiences several sensations at once: being pushed forward as if a hand is resting on your back, momentary and startling blindness, a gentle ringing in your head. You have difficulty discerning whether it is hot or cold, but where you have been prodded is noticeably warmer than the rest of you. Some may suffer from dizziness while others are perfectly fine. Once equilibrium has been reestablished, you will notice you are standing on a long platform and that the room is filled with a soft cerulean light. It's slightly humid and dark despite the glow around you, and nothing is familiar.
For those few who come through Ceta's Ingress, there will be crew of the Moira there to greet you. They tell you of the Ingress, how it is broken, even on this planet, and that the ship is headed back to the origin of this technology. This planet’s Ingress is set precariously atop a floating rock formation, the only way from one area to the next is on small air-propelled boats. Crew members will guide everyone back to the Moira and take them to the Medbay; contracts will be signed posthaste.
WELCOME TO CETA
At first glance, Ceta seems mostly inhabitable, and that's because it is. The atmosphere around the planet is surprisingly thick in most places, sometimes thin in others, and without some way to filter the air, it is mostly unbreathable; it's a giant gas planet, its core made of various molten metals and the atmosphere a mix of oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrous. Ceta's gravity is also uneven, meaning that some areas will have stronger focal points than others. The terrain, when it is visible, appears rather rocky—hardly the best conditions for life and stable living. What's more unusual, however, is that despite this fact, there is, indeed, a small populace "living" among the mist and clouds, but it's clear they do not live here year-round. It's hunting season, and they are there for the bounty.
These visitors have built small platforms that are hooked together by ropes and swinging bridges, which they call "temporaries". Unstable buildings are rare, dangerous, and spread out over these temporaries to prevent damage or accidents. The temporaries float along, swaying and shifting with the planet’s atmosphere, and posted at every point of entry and all open surfaces are a particular set of rules that everyone must abide by. They are written in dark ink and large block letters so that all passing by will stop and read them:
NO FIRE. Flammables, ignition sources, matches, lighters, and anything that creates a spark is prohibited. The atmosphere has higher levels of hydrogen, and the smallest spark will create a problem.
AIR BREATHABILITY. Monitor your vitals. Wear masks or re-breathers if needed.
WATCH THE EDGE. All walkways are the only thing from you and falling. Be cautious and watch your step. These signs should be given their due attention. The edge is just that: the end of where it is safe to walk. If a wooden plank gives way beneath your feet, you will plummet through hundred of miles of atmosphere before hitting the planet’s thin surface. The captains reiterate that crew should be careful and stick to the main temporaries, gather supplies, visit at their leisure, and then go back to the ship.
☄ IT'S A BIRD! IT'S A PLANE!The organisms that have evolved on this planet are unintelligent—a fact that is told to you by the other visitors. As there is no solid materials or ways for them to interact with their environments, these giants float along within the atmosphere, though it appears that they are flying when they are merely navigating through. They travel in groups of three or more and sometimes come close to the outskirts of the temporaries. Because there is an invisible filtration dome around the temporaries, this allows the creatures to pass through without harm and return again into the mist as they please. They are difficult to see at night and are rather skittish in the presence of sudden light.
☄ @ THE MUSEUM Every evening when work is done, artificial light sources illuminate the streets of the temporaries. There is one bar, if you can actually call it that, but the main attraction is a museum. The support structure appears to be made out of the skeletal system of the giants that "swim" and live on Ceta, and though the outside seems rather unassuming, the inside is not for the faint of heart. As it's considered informative, there are displays of the internal structures and functions of the very creatures that seem harmless and as unintelligent as the visitors claim. There are sections of the museum dedicated to their anatomy and what makes them so valuable: inside their air sacs, which is what gives the illusion to flying through the atmosphere, is a mineral that, when harvested, attunes and sharpens the senses so that brain capacity and function excel over one-hundred percent efficiency. Likewise, aside from these informative areas, there is also a history of how and when the visitors began to hunt them for this valuable, unnamed resource.
☄ HARVEST SEASON Are you looking for work? Or perhaps you're bored with your duties aboard the Moira and prefer to see just what it is these visitors do during the day? Hunters will often pay for menial labor to help with the killing and retrieval of the giants of Ceta. It is by day, not by hour, and once aboard one of the many ships, you will be put to work handling equipment or being on the lookout for "signs" of the creatures. Once they've been spotted, the real work isn't in capturing them or even trying to subdue them—though they give a good fight. It's in the harvest, done below deck once they have been safely brought into the ship's cargo areas by the tethers, that can get quite gruesome. As a defense mechanism, cutting into the skin creates a rather noxious emission that can cause disorientation, hallucinations, or unconsciousness. Worst case scenarios can often result in death.
☄ WORD LIMITS As things are beginning to wind up (or down), something seems to have gotten into the MID systems and caused a malfunction. On the morning of 03.13, it suddenly becomes clear that communicating with others who are not from the same universe or similar timelines seems very difficult. Understanding each other becomes rather hopeless as the day continues, and these repercussions can be felt across the entire ship. The Captains send out another MID message that appears as a jumble of unusual letters and symbols. However, there is one word that can be read by everyone and (hopefully) understood: RATCHET. Figuring out this problem shouldn't take long if everyone can leap the language barriers and work together.
( ooc; All New Arrivals: you have the choice of coming through the Moira's Ingress OR Ceta's Ingress. For questions, go here. Please comment to activity check to receive new ranks (if applicable)! )
|
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
hownkai) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
thisavrou_log2016-03-01 02:40 pm
no subject
[There's awe in her tone. A world covered in the most precious of resources. She couldn't even imagine it. She'd never seen more water at once than they could fit in a jug, let alone ever spied anything close to an ocean. She'd heard about them, of course, from Jet and the boys talking about the times before the Wars. But they seemed like something from a fairy tale, in the same way she'd heard about playgrounds and ice cream and movie theaters.]
We ain't hardly got water at all. Just sand and desert and more sand. Can't even wrap my brain around an ocean.
[She's so busy trying to imagine it, trying to think of the old maps Jet had drawn up of the coast line that it takes her a few moments to realize Robin is looking at her. And that the other child is clearly on the verge of panic.
She's parts her lips, taking in the stutter and fear. Some part of her, the childish and selfish part, thought it was something heavy to hold over someone. A notch toward favors and surviving. A bigger part of her, the one that the others had nurtured over the years, made her think of sitting in that office at BLI and all the questions they'd thrown at her about her boys. That fear that anything she said could sell them out, sell herself out.
She can't wish that on anybody else.]
I ain't. [She whispers it, the way all solemn promises are meant to be made.] I don't turn people in. Ain't the right thing. I'm good at trappin' secrets.
no subject
There's still the risk of it, of course - through bribery or threats, Robin doesn't know this girl well enough to know how well she can keep secrets. But, for now, she believes that the Girl won't use this against her.]
Thank you. [She whispers back, a small shaking smile forming upon her lips. The kind that forms when one is coming back from the verge of tears.
She has to pause for a moment before she can speak again, as if to swallow her own dissipating fear.]
So you're from the desert? There are islands like that, where I'm from, but I've never been to one. [It's still so strange to think that she has to explain her own planet to someone else. It's a scale she's not really used to.] The sea doesn't have the sort of water you can drink, though. It's salty and it'll make you sick if you drink it, so going out on it can be really dangerous if you're not prepared.
[Another pause, as she looks up and around the observation deck around them. She takes this opportunity to wipe away a tear that had started to form in that brief moment of terror.]
I've been aboard a few ships. None of them were anything like this.
no subject
's okay. Don't gotta mention.
[She looks away as the other girl puts herself back together, letting her have the time privately to regroup. No use embarrassing Robin further, even if they both know the girl is seeing it. A pretense of privacy is still better than none at all.]
It's all desert as far as anyone can see, 'cept the city. Don't know what's out beyond it. Maybe we got islands and oceans and all that, maybe we don't. World kind of ended, who knows what's left? [It's not like anyone had went beyond Six and managed to come back. With all the poison in the air out that way, trying was a suicide mission.] Why would salt make ya sick? I'd get if it was radiated, that kind of dirty water will cut down your years pretty good.
[She pretends not to see what Robin is doing again, looking down the hallway in the opposite direction.]
Yeah? What was they like? If ya wanna say.
no subject
Not that she's about to swear an oath of loyalty to her or anything, but it's definitely a thought worth filing away.]
The world... Ended?
[What a strange thought. A world that's essentially over - a world where no one has seen the oceans, and can barely even imagine such a concept... Robin has to admit, she's curious as to how it got to such a state, but she isn't going to ask. Not after this kid has made such a point of respecting her own boundaries.]
The salt in the water dehydrates you faster than the water can hydrate you. So the more you drink, the thirstier you get. Lots of sailors have died of thirst, completely surrounded by water like that - it's why you have to plan ahead, it isn't smart to go sailing without a direction in mind.
[It's one of the first things she learned about sailing, back when she was fleeing her burning homeland on a makeshift raft. The trip hadn't been long enough to kill her, but it would have been a lot more easily managed if there had been a barrel of water along for the ride.]
Well they were made of wood, for one. And the waves of the ocean always rock the boat - this place feels too still to call itself a ship.
[And then there's the people. That sort of thing always depends on what kind of ship it is - passenger ships and pirate ships are very different vessels, after all, and Robin's been aboard both kinds. This is the first time she's been aboard a ship where the crew wasn't there voluntarily, though.]
...it's a lot different when people choose to be aboard a boat. It's never a good thing when you don't want to be there.
no subject
Yeah. Long, long time ago.
[Not so long, but it was before she was born and that made it feel like ancient history. The world was so different now anyway, compared to the stories her boys would tell her of the before, that it felt like it happened in a different lifetime.]
Didn't know that. Only warning they give about water at home is if its radiated or not. [Salt was the least of anyone's worries in the desert. Enough was lost to sweat as it was.] It's a shitty way to die, thirsting till you're dust. Ya hear of it happenin' in the Zones, but not someplace with water.
[A wooden way to travel? She couldn't imagine. At least the metal of this place was familiar, in the way that all life in the Zones relied on cars and bikes for transport. She shook her head, a little surprised by the thought of it.
The stillness bothered her a little too. The Trans Am was rickety, held together by Ghoul's determination, and the roads were always bumpy. She'd grown used to feeling the jerk of curves and the jump of rocks.]
Never a good thing when you don't want to be anywhere. Wouldn't know it with how people here act. [She sighs. It's a rehashing of old conversations.] What's it like when people wanna be?
no subject
I don't now what radiated is, but dying of thirst is supposed to be even worse out at sea.
[If Robin were a punnier person she'd say that all the water around at such a time is like rubbing salt in the wound. Fortunately for everyone, she is not the sort of person to say such a thing.]
It depends on the people sailing it. Ferries between islands are much different than merchant ships, and merchants are very different than pirates. Usually everyone has a job, but captains usually don't waste their crew's time with stupid, pointless ones.
[Like barista. Robin's never heard of a ship with a coffee shop before in her life. As much as she likes the stuff, there's absolutely no way you can convince her that this is job is anything even nearly resembling a necessity.]
I think the captains here are just trying to keep us busy.
no subject
[If she sounds like she's reciting something she's heard time and time before, it's because it is. Every runner knows the history that destroyed the Zones, thanks to older runners and D's reminders of the past.]
Pirates?
[She's heard the word, but only in the context of something fun and exciting.]
Have they given people dumb jobs here? I haven't asked. I don't even know what my job's supposed to be.
[She snorts. It's just the same as the tactics BLI pulled.]
Probably. Busy bees don't have time or energy to question the rules.
no subject
It must have been a brutal war, and Robin is glad she wasn't around to see it. Still, though, she has to admit to some curiosity in the matter. She'll have to ask more about it later.]
...I guess if you don't have oceans, you wouldn't have pirates either, huh? Pirates are criminals of the sea - people who have rejected the world government's authority and live by their own rules on the open sea. [Which, admittedly, sounds pretty romantic when she puts it like this. ] For the most part, they're all thieves and killers. You have to be careful around them.
[ Don't get her wrong, though, she'll take pirates over Marines any day of the week.]
And yeah, they give out dumb jobs here. I'm supposed to be the helper of the girl who makes coffee for everyone.
[ As much as she enjoys coffee, the job couldn't be more pointless in her eyes.]
But it won't work on me, at least. I'm not sticking around forever, just to see where they're taking us. What about you?
no subject
Just sounds like a bunch of runners to me. Just like every crashqueen and motorbaby on the road.
[She smiles. Anyone who rages against authority sounds like her kind of people. And it wasn't like most of the runners didn't rack up a kill score when it came to Dracs. She might not like it, but she couldn't even say her own boys hadn't gotten involved in slaughter.] Like home.
Make coffee? That's it? [A pause.] We've got coffee here?
Ain't stickin' around either. They made me get back on, but I'm going to find a way off. They got us here, there's got to be a way to get back.
no subject
We don't have those where I come from. [They sound interesting though. The Girl's smile doesn't escape Robin, though. ] Some pirates are okay, if you know how to talk to them. And there's been a lot more lately, ever since the Pirate King died.
[You still can't trust them, of course, but if you know how to talk to them it's entirely possible for you to be useful to each other. And the increase in pirate numbers since the Great Pirate Era began has only benefited her - give her more ships for her to travel on, and made it harder for the government to track her.]
We do. There's a whole cafe and everything.
[She doesn't stay on that subject, though.]
...if I find a way off, I'll let you know about it before I leave. If there's time.
no subject
No one else does either. [And it's, well, not fine, but she'll deal with it.] You have a King for them? Why do outlaws want a leader?
[Her group had a leader, sort of, in Party, but he wasn't trying to rule the entire Zones. They may have been close to celebrities in the desert, but she can't imagine anyone giving up their own freedoms to listen to the Killjoys.]
Weird. There's already one place to get food and drinks. We don't need more.
[It's all a sign to her of this place, these people, being terribly spoiled. These were luxuries that no group of people needed, a side effect of complacency. These people could never survive in the wastes.
She's pulled from those musing when Robin drops the metaphorical bomb. She jerks and turns to stare Robin down, confused.]
You don't owe me that.
no subject
He was captured by the government eventually, though, and executed publicly. Before he died, though, he shouted to the world that he hid the greatest of his treasures in one place, and that anyone with the skill to find them could keep them. That was two years ago, and since then the seas have been filling with more and more pirates - they all want a chance at finding the One Piece.
[Granted, he was the captain of his own crew, so there were doubtlessly men that gave up their freedoms and their lives to preserve Roger's own, but for the most part the title of Pirate King is more about strength and accomplishments than it is about worldwide authority.]
It's- [She's about to agree that, yeah, the cafe's existence is pretty strange and unnecessary, but then she's sort of caught off-guard by the Girl's response to her offer.]
I mean... [She pauses. How to explain this?] It feels like we're kind of the same, doesn't it? We don't belong here - don't want to be here. We're both running.
[Robin doesn't know what the Girl is running from, and she isn't willing to share as much for herself, but there's a certain kinship there.]
I guess I just feel like... If I can help you, without getting myself caught, then I want to.
[This sort of loyalty isn't common for Robin - and, in fact, she's been learning how dangerous trust can be in the last few weeks. Still, this is the first time she's met a fellow kid she felt she could relate to. It might be against her better judgement, but she's reluctant to give up this new human connection.
At least not without a substantial reason to do so.]
no subject
[Cherri was the most dangerous of the 'Joys, the best sniper in the Zones and everyone knew it. But he was still just Cherri.]
If it's been that long- [And two years was such a long time.] how do people know he wasn't just lyin' about it? What's so great about treasure anyway?
[If it wasn't food or gasoline or an energy source, she can't imagine it being a very big deal.
She turns back to the window, staring hard at the stars. She takes a shaky breath, trying to find the words. Running? Robin couldn't have been more correct. Running was all she'd ever done and the only thing Party had asked of her at the end.
She'd never had any reason to put any faith in anyone outside of the boys and the people they trusted to show her to. She'd never met anyone outside of that circle. But she didn't have that here and she didn't have them to judge for her.
Her faith had to be her own choice now.]
I guess we are, in a way.
[She plucked at the buttons on her vest, biting her lip.]
Thank you. For offerin'.
[She glances at Robin shyly.]
Same, okay? If I get a chance, I'll find ya too.
no subject
I don't really know why they called him that, just that they did. And some people think he was lying, of course, but he did have a treasure. There are plenty of people still alive who had their riches stolen by his crew - most people think that the One Piece is still out there somewhere.
[That's a major difference between Robin's world and the Girl's. Boats run on wind, and food is plentiful if you know how and where to fish. Her world doesn't have an economy of necessities the way the Killjoy's world does.]
I've known a few pirates, though. I think mostly it just gave them a dream...
[A dream with a basis in greed, of course, but a dream nonetheless. It's something to aspire to - and Robin can definitely sympathize with that. She's got her own impossible dream, after all.
At the Girl's glance, Robin gives a soft, but warm smile.]
Thanks.
[A pause.]
...I've been telling them that my name's Clover, by the way. What about you?
no subject
Guess everybody needs something to get them through the night. A dream is a good as anything else.
[She watches the other girl smile and looks away with one of her own.]
Don't have to thank me. Someone does for you, you do for them.
[She snorts.]
Didn't given 'em one. They just signed me as 'girl'. Some people been callin' me Bee. I just let people call me what they want.
no subject
...okay. [ Not using a name at all seems a little strange, to say the least, but Robin can roll with it. ] What should I call you, then?
[ The phrase "people call me what they want" certainly gives Robin an idea where this is going, but... well, it would feel weird to just give the Girl a name without her permission.]
no subject
How uncomfortable she is evident in how she's standing, arms coming around her chest and her shoulders trying to hunch.]
Like I said, some people are callin' me Bee. But you can come up with whatever nickname you want. Everybody always did. I like it better when people do, shows some originality.
[The last part she says quietly and for Robin's benefit. She already wants to have a good opinion of the other girl and she wants to keep the loose respect going.]