october 2019. welcome to the void.

[modblob]

Who: Everyone in Anchor.
What: Fourth Introductory Mingle
When: The Month of October 2019
Where: Around and outside the city.
Warnings: Please add any warnings in the subject lines.

Redshift: Welcome to the v͖͕̺̲̘̱̜͎o̴̦̣̠̦̘̹͞i̯̖d̛̪̬͈̱̦̝͍̕.

Click here to read what characters will experience when arriving in Anchor.

a. sini express delivery service.

There's something odd rolling through Anchor. Whether they wake with it next to their beds or find it sitting neatly in some corridor as if placed there just for them, characters will start finding items that are distinct and unique enough that they have to belong to someone. But where are they coming from? And whose are they?

The easiest way to find out is probably to walk around with the item held high yelling "Does this belong to you?" but that's not a good way to cover a lot of ground.

Don't worry, though! There's someone (something?) to help you. Chiming in periodically from communicators or intercoms across Anchor comes a voice that might sound a little familiar to anyone who made it as far as that spaceship wreckage in the wasteland. Softly laughing and humming, this some-one-thing will cheerfully coax characters in the right direction, giving tips and offering little clues to anyone who might be confused about whose item they have.

Characters struggling with identifying whose item they got might hear a helpful voice whispering out of their device as they move around the city - "Warmer, waaaaarmer...oh no! COLD!" They might hear a laughing voice coming out of a nearby speaker, giving tips or riddles about the person the item belongs to - "Her eyes are grey!" or "What kind of spider is sweet as pie?" Sometimes, it'll just be amused giggling at the efforts of those trying to find their object's owner. That bubbly voice is everywhere, encouraging residents to solve the riddle because "It'll be wooooorth it. Pinky swear!"

And no matter what, it can't be turned off or muted, and it doesn't respond to any direct attempts to communicate in return.

b. flu season.

No one probably takes special notice, at first. It's a sniffle here, a cough or chill there. 'Tis the season in some universe, after all, and even the advanced decontamination process isn't completely flawless. But what starts as a tickle in the throat gets a little worse over the span of a week, or in some cases a lot worse.

Whether laid up for a few days or longer, afflicted characters can expect to feel a few consistent symptoms. Dizziness, lightheadedness, chills and fever, coughing and sneezing (that kind of sneezing that comes in annoyingly long bursts and makes you feel like you've shot your brain out of your nose).

Oh, and hallucinations. Mild ones! Nothing to write home about! (If you even could, anyway.) Hallucinations are the last stage of this mild interuniversal flu, an annoyance more than anything...

And it leaves some people immune, and some people even more susceptible to what might follow.

c. harvestival festival.

Something good is happening in the agricultural sector. Weird, right?

But lo, the whole place has started to bloom seemingly overnight. Tiny fruits become noticeable, then large. Edible vegetation is flourishing, and you can tell which vegetation is edible thanks to the flocks, gangs, and small herds of creatures that have emerged from the still-wild depths of the sector. None of these creatures are aggressive except as a means to protect themselves when scared. Unused to strangers as they are, they'll probably let you get pretty close! Which means you could hunt them, I guess, or try to lasso and bring home some critters to the farm and fenced areas.

The food varies wildly. From electric pink berries the size of a pinkie to giant purple melons nestled in beds of vines. The tastes are as exotic and strange as the fruits themselves. A few people might even recognize some kinds of fruit from home. The root vegetables, squash, and edible vegetation is as colorful as the fruit, though a little more weirdly shaped. Why does that carrot-seeming thing look like a coiled spring? Who knows? You can't judge its life.

The culinarily inclined can take harvested goods to the kitchen areas and start experimenting, but beware! Even plants that look like they could be from Earth or other areas that the residents of Anchor know probably taste a little weirder or more intense than normal. Your best bet for a good recipe is to taste a little bit of everything before you get started. The spicy, the melony, the crunchy, salty, and sweet. There are no available records of what any of these things are, so you'll have to make it up as you go! The only consistent thing across all the agricultural sector's bounty is that NONE of it is poisonous. And none of it will get you high, Klaus and Kabal, so don't get your hopes up.

Navigation.

Comments

[benhargreeves]

[ Ben tends to think of himself as someone who is difficult to surprise. But someone saying in complete seriousness that they're a ninja? Yeah, that throws him for a moment. Because Genji sure does, like, have a sword, and he isn't cracking up or saying he really had Ben going there for a moment. So... he means it. ]

Wow. That's... awesome. I've never met a real-life ninja before.

[ Said the real-life superhero with powers that let him summon giant eldritch murder monstrosities from another dimension. But all that is just his life. Just boring or awful. Ninjas? Ninjas are cool. They use cleverness and skill and precision. Even when they are forced to kill, it is quick and so very clean.

Ripping people limb from limb with giant tentacles is a very messy business. It is not quiet, or skilled, or neat. So yeah, Ben's geeking out a bit. ]

I don't know. Maybe? I sort of got to 16, died, kicked around as a ghost for a decade and a half and showed up here just sort of... 30 and alive again. It's so weird having a pulse after that long that anything else that's changed is small by comparison, y'know?

[ No point in hiding the whole dying thing now. Might as well answer what Genji was probably already wondering about and explain how he is alive now. ]

Would you like some coffee beans to take home? As a thank you, for returning this?

[arcadedragon]

[The smile he has on his face can probably be heard in his voice.]

Usually meeting a ninja is the last thing you do.

[It's generally a very bad thing if you're meeting a ninja, often followed by having a sword skewered through parts where most people don't want swords. But behind the mask Genji is grinning and Ben's smile is nice, it's been a long time since a smile was directed at him and Genji realizes how much he's enjoying this place so far. Nearly everyone he's met has either been impressed or delighted to meet him, and even the one person who'd been afraid had quickly come around.

What a difference from back home where he was viewed with pity for the most part. And if not that, then fear. Either of what he'd become or who he was - it didn't matter the reason, it did little for his sense of self worth and any small hope of normalcy.]

It's a rare gift to be pulled back from death and have a second chance at life. I suppose everything pales in comparison to that.

[He'd do well to focus on the good things rather than the bad, because Ben is right. Everything else is small compared to being alive.]

If you can spare them I would love some. It's odd to wake up without having coffee. It had been my routine for so long and now it's strange to be without.

[benhargreeves]

Well, it's different meeting you not, like, on the job!

[ Surely Genji meets plenty of people, going about his day to day life. They might not realize he is a ninja at the time, but despite his job, he's just a person like anybody else, right? Ben wonders if that is the reason for the armor: that it helps him to be super stealthy or super deadly or something of that sort.

When Genji says being given life again is a rare opportunity, his smile turns a little rueful around the edges. ]

You've got no idea.

[ Or at least, so Ben assumes... ]

Just trust me on this. Dying? Sucks. Being a ghost? Sucks.

[ And he nods for Genji to follow him, turning his steps in the direction of the quarters he shares with Klaus. They have plenty of coffee to spare, especially for someone who is still adjusting to living in this place. As they walk, he keeps talking: ]

It could've been worse I guess. You - saw in these about my brother, Klaus. Number Four. He can talk to the dead, so it's not like I was totally alone. I had him. But everyone else... everything else...

[ Ben breaks off, shaking his head. Words can't begin to capture it, and if he tries for too long and thinks about it too much he's only going to depress himself. He doesn't want that. So instead he merely finishes: ]

Anyway it's... you're right. About second chances. We can't let them go to waste.

[ They reach the door, and Ben unlocks it, gesturing Genji to head on in. The space is a little messier than Ben would like - hurricane Klaus strikes again - but he leads Genji to the little kitchen area and starts rifling around the cupboards looking for coffee. ]

Are you adjusting okay, other than the shortage of cofffee?

[arcadedragon]

I can imagine. Dying would be immensely unpleasant.

[He's been there. Granted he didn't die, but he was mere moments away from it. If he hadn't been rescued when he had, he would have quickly bled out all over the floor of their family's temple. As it was he'd barely been conscious for most of that, blood loss and pain causing him to woozily ping-pong between coherency and screaming and struggling to get away because he had no idea what was going on.]

I'm glad you weren't alone. Being by yourself is no way to live - it seems fine until you realize that there is no outlet for anything and all you are doing is bottling everything up inside you. It's unhealthy.

[He's likely talking about himself more than Ben. He steps inside the room, not noticing the mess as this is someone who last made his bed when he was a child and his father scolded him into doing it. ]

I think so. I have found a room, and where the food comes from. The robots forced me into some ridiculous clothes, so I have that as well. I forgot how inconvenient it is to not have pockets.

[He gestures to himself and his skintight armor with no room to store anything.]

[benhargreeves]

I wasn't a fan.

[ Ben can do this; talk about it if it's obliquely, abstractly, making broad statements, most of them half-jokes. It's a little strange, though. Talking about it. For so many years it had just been him and Klaus, and Ben's death had been so deeply traumatic for his brother. Even if he had wanted to talk about it (he hadn't), it would've hurt Klaus a great deal. So they just... didn't ever talk about it, apart from the occasional crack about him being a ghost or kicking the bucket.

He picks up on the specificity of Genji's statements about being alone. Not hard to guess... ]

You're speaking from experience?

[ Being alone, Ben knows - and it sounds like Genji knows too - can be wonderful, but only if it's an optional retreat. When there's no other choice, when it is forced isolation, that silence can start to claw you apart from the inside.

He brightens a little when Genji mentions the robots giving him clothes. ]

Oh yeah, you don't need to worry about them. I know some people who show up are kinda nervous around robots in general but I've been here for months and they're totally harmless. There was sort of an incident with some nanites but that's a whole other kettle of fish.

[ He unearths the bags of coffee grounds and selects a big one, pulling it down from the shelf and holding it out for Genji to take. The mention of pockets, the gesture... it's not exactly and invitation, but Ben seizes it nonetheless. ]

I was... kind of wondering about the outfit choice but I wasn't really sure how to ask without coming across like a dick. That's the thing with this place. Everyone is from such different worlds... Like for all I know for you the... armor? Is like, hot off the runway, New York fashion week couture or whatever.

[arcadedragon]

Yes, I was alone for a very long time. Some of it was amongst others, but I was still adrift on my own. It is strange how sometimes the presence of many can heighten the feeling of isolation.

[Probably because he was treated like an unstable science experiment in Blackwatch. He takes the coffee, he can't smell it yet, but rest assured when he's back in his room he will be stuffing his face in it and huffing.]

Nanites? As in the tiny robotic technology? We have that here?

[Well that could be terrible. Or positive, there are two sides to every outcome as Zenyatta would say.]

It is not fashion, it is armor. A carbon fiber alloy so I am very light and mobile for fighting.

And it looks cool.

[He would normally show off by doing backflips, but as they're indoors he'll settle for brightening all his lights before dimming them.]

[benhargreeves]

No kidding.

[ For Ben, that feeling had been profound when he was young; any time he would see regular kids his own age, they were like another species to him. He desperately wanted to be like them, to be normal. But he could never imagine it. It felt like such a gulf. And sometimes, that gulf spread between himself and his siblings, too. Adrift was a good word for it.

Ben wonders what it was that had set Genji adrift in a sea of other people. His profession? Or was that a result rather than a cause? He doesn't really know how one gets into the ninja profession. Had he even had a choice, or was he raised into it?

There's just no way to ask that sort of question to someone you've just met, though. Even if it would help to even out the disparity between how much Genji now knows about him, thanks to the comics, and how much he knows about Genji. But that's just the way it goes.

Instead he focuses on answering the questions Genji asks. ]

'Have' isn't exactly the word I'd use. We weren't controlling them. There were nanites around. They went haywire and started lurking in the shadows, reading people's minds and then assuming the form of their worst nightmares. So that sure was a fun week.

[ He says it with wry humor, since obviously, it was terrible from start to finish. ]

Nothing like just trying to walk down a corridor and coming face to face with your deep-seated trauma or whatever. Also they attacked anybody who didn't run like hell, so that was a whole... thing.

[ Ben sticks to describing the experience of running into the nanites rather than even trying to explain the science behind why they acted that way or how they did it. Peter is the guy who understands all that, not him. ]

Hell yeah, it looks cool.

[ He still kind of wonders why walk around in armor all the time, but Genji had said it was for fighting. Maybe he's used to living in such peril that it's just normal for him now. Plus that light trick is rad. Ben doesn't really blame him. Honestly, if there were some socially acceptable way for him to go around with a mask over his face constantly, so no one could see his expressions.... he might go for it. As he was so acutely reminded recently, the whole concept of being watched and looked at... not really a fan sometimes. ]

Is it bulletproof?

[ Ben just asks out of curiosity, but then laughs a moment later at his own eagerness. ]

Wow, super didn't mean that to sound so much like I was going to pull out a gun if you said no, oops.

[arcadedragon]

So there are rogue nanites that we need to be concerned about? That may be the most unsettling thing I have been told since arriving here.

[Nope, he doesn't like that at all. Something to do with nanobiotechnology and nanites are what likely created Reaper out of Commander Reyes. But also might be the source of Moira's healing abilities. He's conflicted, he doesn't know enough about it to be anything more than deeply concerned. Should he be frightened?]

They created hallucinations of fears? I revoke my previous statement, that is the most unsettling thing.

[He's glad to change the subject to how cool he looks because he'd rather not imagine what that would even show him. He's basically living his worst fears all the time. And short of making his legs and arm non-functional there's not a lot that he's really scared of. ]

It is not. But it does not need to be. If you did pull out a gun and shoot me I could simply deflect the bullets.

But in such a close space they would likely hit you via ricochet so you should not do that.

[He doesn't even sound smug about his abilities, merely stating a fact. ]

[benhargreeves]

I'm not gonna lie to you, it was pretty dicey for a while there. But I'm pretty sure the tech geniuses around the place fixed whatever went haywire in the nanite's programming. They're not an issue, anymore. We've got fresh new problems to worry about.

[ He wants to reassure Genji, but give him realistic expectations. And there's always fucking something going wrong, isn't there? It was just that, for Ben at least, those nanites had stood out as a particularly unpleasant experience. Maybe whatever comes next would be even worse. Wouldn't that be just awful. ]

Deflect them how?

[ Ben would've changed the subject if Genji sounded unwilling to talk about his combat abilities, but - perhaps unsurprisingly, since the guy is a freaking ninja and all - he doesn't seem alarmed at all by the line of questioning. And Ben is awfully curious what he means. Does he had some kind of forcefield or...? ]

Good to know, though - if anybody starts shooting at you, I'll make sure to get well clear.

[arcadedragon]

[They're standing too close to each other for Genji to give him a proper demonstration, and also he's holding a bag of coffee that he doesn't want to put down because he's starting to be able to smell it even through the armor and the scent is sustaining him right now.]

I could show you if you'd like, but not here. I do not want to leave sword gouges in your ceiling. Perhaps another day? I could use the practice in any case. Being here will likely cause me to not want to train and become complacent and lazy.

[There is an arcade. Who wants to meditate and do seventy-thousand squats a day when there's an ARCADE?]

[benhargreeves]

Seriously?

[ Ben assumes this demonstration is not going to involve deflecting actual bullet, he's not insane, but all the same, an offer of a demonstration of sweet sword tricks has him grinning, his glee barely suppressed to conversationally-acceptable levels. ]

That would be - so. Cool.

[ It's only be sheer force of will that Ben holds himself back from suggesting that a good way for Genji to train would be to teach him some cool sword tricks. Not that Ben would ever want to use them on another person - he has some perfectly good otherdimension eldritch horrors in his tummy for that. But it's... well, fun. And awesome. He'd never learned a skill that was just frivolous. Just for the joy of it.

And this is his second chance at life. He should be seizing opportunities wherever he can. ]

[arcadedragon]

[He'd be happy to show him the basics, the only problem being they'd need another sword. He won't let anyone touch his and training with a stick kind of sucks.]

Absolutely. You do not have to actually shoot at me, unless you'd like to. I've not been here long enough to know if there are even guns and ammo.

Conversely, I do not know how to shoot a gun. Someone on my team offered to teach me once, but we never got a chance to do it.

[benhargreeves]

I'll pass on the shooting. This is probably gonna sound crazy after you read these...

[ And Ben takes that opportunity to drop the stack of comics onto the table. Should give Klaus a laugh, when he found them. Maybe he and Ben can look at them together, later. Talk about the bits that were left out. ]

...but I'm not actually super big on violence.

[ Yes, in his brain, shooting a gun at Genji to facilitate sword tricks would be violence, but just the sword tricks themselves are not. It makes sense! Sort of!

Something Genji said, however, sparks Ben's interest. After everything Genji said about isolation, he is surprised to hear he worked in a group. Then again, hadn't he said something about feeling even more alone around other people? ]

You had a team?

[arcadedragon]

I did. Overwatch. Blackwatch. But that was in the past.

[He doesn't really want to elaborate, but since he inadvertently knows far too much about Ben, he feels like he should explain more to bring them even.]

Overwatch was an organization that set about to protect people from global violent forces. They watched over them to ensure their safety. But near the end it became.. their vision was clouded. Politics and bad choices made people no longer trust them.

I left before it was disbanded, but they are no more. I have heard they are trying to recall the force for a new threat, but I'm unsure if they'll be successful in that.

The world needs heroes. But that's not what we were.

[Says the guy who will make a dramatic entrance at the last minute to save all of their asses.]

[benhargreeves]

[ Ben listens, interested - from the sound of it, this team was a much more formal sort of affair than he had guessed. It's perhaps understandable that when he hears talk of teams, Ben first thinks of small groups of people, family or friends, working together and caring about one another to some degree.

But the team Genji had been speaking of sounds more, to Ben, like the Temps Commission. Some very large machinery, in which he played some small part. They were dealing with global-scale threats, after all. And Ben can tell there was a complicated history, there. Something about the way Genji speaks about them, the abstract allusions to clouded vision and bad choices... Genji might not sound overtly bitter, but Ben thinks he isn't imagining that there might be some bitterness and disillusionment there.

He feels a little guilty for asking since the topic is clearly a very personal one, so Ben tries to lighten the mood with a joke. ]

Hey, what d'you know? We've got something in common. I left before the Academy disbanded, too.

[ And by left obviously he means died a horrific violent death at the tender age of 16 but if you can't joke about this shit it just eats you up. Or you joke about it and it still eats you up. But he wants to break at least a little of the tension that has crept in. ]

I'm guessing nobody made comics about you guys?

[arcadedragon]

If they did I wasn't made aware of them. There were propoganda posters, but I was not on any of them. They had better figureheads than the ninja from the crime family.

[Not that they would have publicized that. Or even used his name most likely, but either way he'd not been asked to pose heroically for billboards. Though he absolutely would have refused so that may have played a part.]

If the recall is successful I will push for an action figure. I think I would make an excellent action figure.

[He'd come with great sword accessories and a dragon. Who doesn't want an action figure that comes with a dragon?]

[benhargreeves]

[ Ben's eyebrows raise at the casual mention that Genji is from a crime family. That means mob, right? Ben's pretty sure that must be slang for mob, no matter the country or the universe Genji is from. Which immediately strikes him as probably a pretty fucked-up scene to grow up in. Is it just his own bias making him think that? For all he knows, growing up a kid of the mob is a hundred times healthier than his whole home situation. He really has no fucking gauge for what's normal and he knows it. ]

Screw that, I think you'd make a great figurehead.

[ He says it like it's a compliment because even if that wasn't what Genji wanted, those are some pretty shitty reasons not to put him on the posters or whatever. Although... propaganda, yeesh. He wasn't kidding about the politics and things going off the rails and not being heroes.

But Ben is polite enough not to ask for now why they would need that propaganda. He just grins and says: ]

And you'd make an even better action figure. For sure.

[arcadedragon]

[Yakuza, but yes. He wouldn't say his childhood was bad, especially since he was a spoiled rich brat who got pretty much everything he wanted. But it sure didn't make socializing or making friends easy. Now that he wasn't a part of that life anymore he had to relearn how to be a person, which was even more difficult once he stopped considering himself a person in the first place. It was hard to pretend to be human when he thought of himself as some sort of cyborg hybrid, neither human nor robot.

But that was some introspection for another time.]

I'd light up, it would be great.

I'm not sure I'd want to be the figurehead, I do not make the best decisions. Nor would I want the responsibility. Being famous sounds like it's very tiring.

[He figures Ben might know a bit about that.]

[benhargreeves]

I mean, all the best action figures do! But would you have a catchphrase?

[ This is kind of a fun game to play, and Ben is surprised how easily he is chatting with this man who was a stranger only a little while ago. A small part of him wonders honestly if it is because he can't see Genji's face. Ben would've expected it would make conversation strained, but actually it is kind of making it easier? ]

Probably a good call. I wouldn't want that shit either.

[ And when Genji makes that knowing comment about fame being tiring, Ben laughs, recognizing it as an allusion to what he'd seen in the comics - both the tacky in memoriam stuff but also all the details in the comics themselves about how people all around the world had heard of them. ]

I can confirm that, yeah. A couple of my siblings liked it, but I never did. I'm not saying that to try to superior or anything. I'm just. Not into the limelight.

[arcadedragon]

Ninja are generally quiet.

[Screaming about dragons notwithstanding.]

I wouldn't like it either, I do not like having all my actions analyzed and talked about. And people are very cruel.

[Not 'can be cruel' they just are. Some are better at hiding it than others, but it's there under the surface. He's convinced of it.]

I'm sure there are perks though. Free food. People giving you things. Influence and power I suppose.

[benhargreeves]

[ See? This guy gets it!

Ben's not sure he's ever met someone who so immediately and accurately articulated why it was awful to him. The fame. The surveillance at home. Genji seems to understand for some reason that horror of being observed and remarked on, and Ben wonders why. But there's no way to really ask that without being super invasive, so. He'll just have to wonder for now.

He wrinkles his nose theatrically when Genji lists influence and power as potential bonuses of being famous. Of course, he's not wrong for many people and Ben's sure there are plenty for whom those things would be a dream. But he'd never wanted all that. ]

Overrated. I'll take a little peace and quiet any day.

[ Ben's eyes drift back to that stack of comics on the table, then to Genji once again. ]

If you... want something better to read than those, we found a library in this place a few months back. It's not much, but I sorta run it, and I've got a masterlist of books there you can look through. Not a lot of comics, but plenty that's entertaining.

[arcadedragon]

Some enjoy that. But not me. I would rather have peace and tranquility.

[He seems to perk up at that, while a library isn't an arcade he's still a fan. Anything to pass the time, the trashier the better.]

I would enjoy that. I seem to have an excess of time here and at some point the arcade will lose its appeal a little.

[When he has the high score on every game that is.]