E
V
E
N
T
L
O
G
|
far from nowhere
"the trees rustle in the evening when we stand uneasy before our own thoughts."
With the events of Del Pascia behind the Moira, things are only now beginning to settle—and not very well. Through the combined efforts of some of the crew, D-E-L and her permanent residents were incinerated into the dust of space. While it’s not the most peaceful end, it is one, and not many are going to be thinking back on how nice Del Pascia’s facilities were for quite some time. Repairing what they could of the ship’s interior and putting as much distance between the Moira and the prison as possible, those aboard are informed by Navigation that they are approaching another planet. This means, of course, the potential for better supplies, as some things are beginning to dwindle, and the Captains elect to dock so long as the crew follows protocol. WELCOME TO AMISSIS-RE
Amissis-Re is an unregistered planet with no documented histories or signs of life. The Moira’s Navigation crew have scanned the planet for any usable resources and have discovered a faint signal emitting from beneath the surface of Amissi-Re. Using the transporters and any other crafts located in the Cargo Bay, the crew are able to travel to the source of the signal. Upon arriving in its exact location, they’ll find a small series of lakes that lead to a tower-like structure that appears to be in use. Crew must cross a poorly assembled bridge system that sways and dips when weight is applied to it in order to gain access to the entrance. Once there, a woman comes out to greet them and explains, excitedly, that she is so very happy that they have come to Amissis-Re.
Everyone can go home.
Their host insists that she has done the impossible and has somewhat fixed the Ingress that’s been built on Amissis-Re a long time ago, and what’s more, she can send crew home for short bursts of time. Upon following this woman inside, crew will find that the planet is not, in fact, barren at all. Diving deep into the underbelly of Amissis-Re, it’s like an eternal factory of machines, and while vast, for whatever reason, it also seems incredibly welcoming...
☄ LEAP OF FAITH ( 05.01 and on ) The barren planet of Amissis-Re is devoid of vegetation and organic life except for a lone woman, and the planet itself is an intricate honeycomb of machines that go for miles below the surface. Yet, that seems insignificant and unimportant in comparison to the news that the crew has just received. After Thán has looked at the Ingress, he tells the crew that he cannot say for certain that it is properly functioning, but Emiri native, Ben Link, will volunteer to test it out.
An elevator takes crew down to a glass platform that overlooks an inverted Ingress portal. In order to return home, the Moirans will have to take a leap of faith and jump in. Ben, in order to show his commitment to the crew and willingness to help get them home, takes that jump with Captain Thán seconds behind him. Jumping feels like dropping through wind; lights swirl, it’s warm, and a soft buzzing encompasses you as you fall. You don’t feel the landing. One moment you’re falling, and the next, you’re in a new world.
A few hours pass before a similar elevator rises from below and to the left of the Ingress, stopping beside the platform. Ben and Thán step out unharmed.
It works, and everyone can temporarily go home. Will you jump? ☄ COMBINE THE EXTREMES ( 05.01 and on ) The woman that greeted the crew and led them to the platform will allow anyone that wants to go home the opportunity to go. There’s only one catch: it’s not permanent. She’s worked for years to fix the Ingress so that she can return to her own home but hasn’t been able to make the trip an everlasting one. Everyone always comes back. Always. They go for a few hours, at first, but that amount of time increases with each visit.
The one guideline, she says, is that you can’t go alone. Each trip requires a partner, or it becomes too much for the mind to bear. These rules are simple: the world takes shape depending on who jumps first, but if crew go hand-in-hand and leap at the same time, the worlds combine. This new world will be populated with people that existed in both and may appear to be a jarring combination of both worlds. It may seem unusual, but if the woman is asked, she’ll explain that the combined world does exist as there are more universes than can be imagined. The Ingress tries to take the person to their own home, their original home, but when jumping together, it finds the closest possible match and deposits them there instead.
From that point on, you can travel the world together or split up, but remember, this world is a living, functioning world. It doesn’t matter if it’s the home of one crew member or a combination. You meet other people. You can get hurt. You influence and are influenced by others.
Be cautious, and enjoy your visit “home”. ☄ LINGER ON ( 05.05 and on ) The more times the Amissis-Re Ingress is visited, the more it seems that your trips last longer and the experience becomes even more vivid. More real and harder to distinguish from the current reality that you know. It’s difficult to explain why, but you get the feeling that maybe if you went without the aid of the host, that perhaps you’d be able to stay. Forever. It takes some subterfuge, but in time, you see your chance: she’s nowhere in sight, and you take it.
The world you are in now is completely your own, whether another crew member accompanied you or not. The people you know are there, everything around you is exactly as you remember. A few hours pass, and you don’t feel that familiar tug, that invisible hook at the base of your spine that signals that your visit is over. Even more time goes by, and you’re still in that world, your home. When the first day has passed, you begin to question if you’ll ever go back, or if life on the Moira was all a dream. The person with you won’t be able to convince you otherwise, and they’ll start to feel less real, a stranger that you used to know.
There’s only one way to go back to the Moira. Someone from the other side has to come in and retrieve you both. Once in, contact with a third will jump-start a link through the Ingress, and it will pull all crew back to the platform.
|
![[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_log2016-05-01 09:04 pm
no subject
All Elle can do is stare at him. Possibilities explode in her mind.
I would know if I'd had a kid -- Right?
Alternate universes, we know they exist. Maybe she just looks like me.
But I could have. I could still. He could be from my future.
She didn't look exactly like me. I have blue eyes. But radiation can do weird things, can't it? Ghoul eyes turn blue.
Never mind it's not the same kind of blue, never mind she knows pretty well how many problems that can cause ghouls. This has thrown her off-guard so badly her thoughts are taking an irrational spin. Irrational enough that she's reaching out before she can stop herself, fluffy chunks of muffin lying abandoned in her lap, her hand seeking his arm, as if trying to test for herself that he's really here. This could be my --
"You don't -- You don't have to apologize." Her words are tumbling out of her mouth quickly. "I didn't... You didn't do anything wrong. I didn't think you were -- being... rude, or anything -- You saved my life. It's okay. Really."
no subject
"But it was enough that I paused for a moment."
It was both embarrassing and good to admit. Glad she hadn't gotten pissed off about it, too. Because that would have been hell on his emotions.
"Glad I was helpful, anyway."
no subject
"I'm sorry."
This isn't something she can really... do anything about. She can't help... not being someone else. But she -- She still feels the need to apologize for it, anyway. For putting him through that. She suddenly feels guilty for touching him -- his arm that she knows can disappear -- and she pulls her hand back.
no subject
"I was just wondering though if you had known anyone named 'Kazuhira'. Or... Well my name actually means 'Peace'. So that, also."
He tried to not be hopeful. It was there despite himself, though. The idea maybe somewhere else, some other version of himself could have had a better life. Though he realistically knew that the resemblance here was superficial, like with so many on board.
no subject
And now he's asking -- asking if he... He's wondering the same thing she is, isn't she? About the different universes. He's... He's wanting to know if she -- if she's his mom, from another universe, still alive. Fuck. Elle wracks her mind, hoping and praying there's someone she's met, that she has a happy story to give him.
"I... I. Let me check." She reaches for her Pip-Boy dials and flips over to her journal. She scans the notes hurriedly, but there's a year's worth of entries, here. She bites her lower lip as she starts to give up.
But, there's... There's one thing she can say. One thing... that -- that might not... make it better. But it's the only thing she can give him. She doesn't lift her eyes from her Pip-Boy screen. "I... I -- There isn't... anyone I can remember. But... That's the thing." She tries to smile. It doesn't quite work. "There's... Honestly, there's a lot I don't remember. Can't." She does look at him, now, as she lifts a hand up to the scar on her forehead. The ugly one, the one Benny gave her. "I only have a year's worth of memories," she confesses, quiet.
There could be someone. Could've been. She may have known someone, someone close to her, with a name that means "peace." And... she wouldn't know.
no subject
"My mother couldn't remember me." He admitted. "But it was... because she was sick. She caught a disease... ah... well, it wasn't something easily treated at the time."
Nothing that would leave a scar like the one he could see hints of.
"It's fine, though. You look different enough. And resemblances happen." Memories lost. But that was probably as far as it went; not as if she could remember, even if there were more similarities. "I guess I should have learned more about you before I went and put my foot in my mouth, huh? Failure on my part. I usually do my research."
Emotional decisions had never been his strong point.
no subject
He's apologizing again. More obliquely, but he is. Elle's heart quakes. She doesn't know what to say. If she should tell him what she's thinking. But then words just start falling out of her mouth anyway.
"You... It -- You don't -- You don't have to be sorry. I haven't... I haven't really talked to anyone here about it, and it's -- You haven't upset me, or anything, really. It's -- This kind of thing, it'd shake up anybody, and, I mean, there's... There's always the chance that you -- that I'm..."
Elle doesn't know what to do with her hands. She's flailing with them uselessly as she talks, and so she clasps them, twining her fingers together tightly. "There could be -- a 'you' in my universe. And I just... I don't know it. I wouldn't... be able to know. So..." She licks her lips, suddenly nervous. "You don't... You don't have to be sorry."
no subject
If she did have something like that, she would deserve to find them. Because, from the other end, being alone in the world was one of the most painful things anyone could go through. Something he knew too well, felt too keenly.
"You seem to get along pretty well. I have a friend who lost his memory. Head injury and... well, some outside influence. He's a good man. Wondering what it's like."
no subject
What it's... like? Where does she even begin? She chews on her lower lip for a moment. "Sometimes, there... there are these... I don't know. It's... difficult to explain. Sometimes... I -- It's... It's like waking up from a dream that you can't remember. You can... still feel it. The emotions. And even almost... the motion. Like you were thinking really hard about doing something, like raising your arm, but you end up not doing it, but your body still feels ready for it. But, sometimes, you... Like it's at the tip of your tongue, almost. There are these moments, sometimes, where it's like -- you're walking down stairs, and you reach the end, and you thought there was an extra step. You know...?"
no subject
Then lowered it with a heavy sigh.
"Guess I keep hoping things will come back to him... But maybe that's all there is for him anymore. What he is now." Grimly. He had realized he still loved Big Boss, and that he also loved his phantom, but they felt so different now. And he couldn't stand the idea of one looking at him through the other's eyes.
no subject
Maybe that's all there is for him anymore. What he is now. Elle stares at her hands, lying limp in her lap, palm up, fingers relaxed. Maybe that's why she didn't ever think of it that way. Because she had to carry it with her from the beginning, and it was the first thing she really realized she had. It was so obvious, she didn't see it.
"Maybe that's true," Elle says, her voice quiet, eyes still down. "I know... I don't really think there's... any hope that I'll... get back what I lost." She slowly curls her fingers. "All I can really do... is make new memories." And then, even more softly, as if she's reciting something, "Begin again. Let go." She exhales, long and slow. "It's... hard. Feels... impossible sometimes. But, we... If we don't?" She shakes her head. There are a lot of ways that sentence could end. Too many. And... none of them good.
no subject
Kaz had put so much pressure on the Phantom to regain his former self that it only then occurred to him that... well... maybe he couldn't. The him that was there before was just gone. It didn't mean that he couldn't still be someone a little independently minded; like she said, there were memories that were his, that weren't Big Boss's. He organized giant photoshoots of men on motherbase to give to him.
Those were his memories, and his alone.
"I guess I've not been really fair to him, then. I've been wanting to know who he was, been pissed off about who he isn't.... Guess I shoulda been paying more attention to who he is."
And in a gesture that reflected hers, he looked through the back of his phantom hand as it rested in his own lap.
no subject
Something she had to learn the hard way. She had been so blind with Mr. House. When she looks back, she thinks she wanted to be blind. That she chose it. Everyone else questioned House, his motives, what was really going on. Cass was right. If someone promised me all the lights of Vegas, I'd consider it, too... but I wouldn't say yes until I saw what was behind the curtain. They were all right.
And the same thing happened with Dean, too. That holotape she found in Dean's safe, the one he was clearly planning on using to blackmail Vera with... She had been so stricken when she first listened to it. But, looking back... She shouldn't have been surprised. That was the kind of person Dean was -- who Dean is. And there were signs the whole time.
Maybe these aren't the best examples, not with what Dean did, not with the way things went with Mr. House. Kazuhira has nothing but nice things to say about his friend. But... The principle, it's the same, isn't it?
"It always feels... so obvious, when we look back." Her voice is quiet, almost lilting, it's so... nearly wistful.