redshiftlogs | november 2019. welcome to the void.

november 2019. welcome to the void.

Who: Everyone in Anchor.
What: Fifth Introductory Mingle
When: The Month of November 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. outbreak.

There's a plague in the city.

What was an annoyance before, a bug that seemed to be passing, has erupted into a full-scale biomedical hazard. Onset is slow. It’s a near mystery who is infected and who isn't, who is immune and who isn't. Doors lock themselves seemingly at random to prevent people passing through. Is that person with you one of the sick? How do you know? Would they tell you if they were?

The city will do its best to isolate the ill, once again locking them out of communal areas and trying to force them down toward the MedBay for quarantine. All bots will be temporarily shifted to plague protocols, rounding up and caring for the ill as best they can. (Lucky you, you get your cough syrup with a mixer courtesy of the barbot.) But they might not always get things right, and what healthy person wants to be locked away in a ward full of the violently ill? How do the bots even know which is which?

The ill will slowly find themselves dizzy, lightheaded, with chills and fever. They may cough hard enough to spit blood from irritated throats, or sneeze so long and hard they give themselves bloody noses. The symptoms can vary wildly depending on body chemistry, species, and dozens of other factors, making it difficult to pin down a specific set that indicates a person is infected. All bodily fluids are dangerously infectious. Maybe you want to keep your distance from your friends if you start to feel the onset, to keep them safe. But you also want to keep your freedom, not get trapped in a room full of people who seem to be dying. And anyone who was exposed to the first outbreak will find themselves either completely immune to this new one through early exposure...or far more susceptible, their immune systems doing almost nothing to protect them, with extreme symptom sets that hit them much harder than the average infected.

And through all of this, that voice that cheerfully chirped out helpful hints during the item exchange, that giggled and sang songs in the crashed spaceship in the wasteland can be heard again - but this time it's different. This time, there's very little cheer left, and though the commentary is still sing-song, it's much harsher, more monotone and without much energy. 'Go on, hurry up to the MedBay. No breaking quarantine!' it says, or to those moving through the city with friends, 'You must not like those people much, are you sure you want to get them sick?' In the depths of the worst of it, in the third week of the month, people may start hearing more of those 'helpful' suggestions - 'Maybe it would be better if we just left them out in the wastelands, you know? For the greater good and all...'

Mod Note: An NPC post will be going up next weekend on

redshiftrp to supplement this prompt. Keep an eye out!

b. gone to shit.

With 90% of the city's bots repurposed to serve the ill (the matchmaking bot being the notable exception), things are starting to go downhill fast elsewhere. Didn’t realize how much work the bots were actually doing? You can't avoid knowing now.

Restaurants, slowly coming back online after the increased activity in the agricultural areas, are promptly shut down again with things starting to go bad in the fridges. The VR rooms have no attendants to help with glitches. The maintenance bots are prowling the halls looking for ill people to assist to the MedBay. The spa bots are all down in the lower levels helping keep people comfortable while they convalesce, leaving the spas to run themselves. Sometimes to overflowing. It's definitely going to be an adventure discovering what else the bots were doing to keep things running smoothly.

There's no bots manning the bar (make your own drinks while you can), but this also means there are no bots cleaning up the messes people leave behind in the bar either. The detritus of people living their lives starts to pile up - which means if you don’t want garbage filling up the most used common rooms, you're going to have to apply some good old elbow grease. Exactly what you wanted to do while everyone is violently ill, right?

c. dance of the moonlight jellies.

In spite of everything going on elsewhere in the colony, something magical is happening in the lakes and ponds of the park. Maybe your healthy or recovering character stumbles across it on their own. Maybe they see the glow from a higher levels and are drawn down to it. Maybe a persistent and super helpful voice, the same voice from the item exchange, the same voice that suggested throwing the sick out into the wasteland, suggests that you should go down and look at what's happening there.

However you ended up in the park, the place is filled with a silvery glow that emanates from the ponds, rivers, and lake. Fish have come up from the bottom, from where they were buried under the sand. They look almost like East Asian dragons, for those familiar with Earth. They're long, muscular, with two sets of fins trailing in the water like legs. Their heads are delicate, beautiful things that trail whiskers in the water along beside them.

And they're dancing.

In loops and whirls, over and under each other, diving deep and then rising up again to create patterns of light and shadow. Anyone who watches for more than a minute can start to feel relief moving through them, calm, the sense that things will be okay. Watching the dance is almost like meditation. Probably, for some, a much-needed break.

Navigation.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

'M sick.

[He manages to muster enough energy to make it pointed. No shit he's burning up, Onni.

Part of him feels bad; if Onni and Reynir had felt this awful then he might have done a bit more to help them out. He'd just figured it was a normal bout of flu that seems to come around every autumn. This feels like dying.

He's maybe being a bit dramatic. Still, the brush of Onni's knuckles is enough to send a shiver through him, and he curls up further so that he looks more like a ball of blankets than a person.]

Yes. I'd realized that a few days ago.

[He says it with a hint of teasing, since obviously Lalli is feeling well enough to be sassy. But he's obviously not feeling well enough to do much else. Onni's touch makes Lalli shiver and curl up into a tighter ball, so he pulls his hand back and sighs. It's no surprise, but he can tell that Lalli is going to be a much bigger pain about this than Reynir was.]

Are you cold?

Mm-hmm.

[He's miserable and he wants the entire world to know it, Onni. Nobody's ever been as miserable as him.]

Just leave me here. Gon' die.

[It comes out muffled due to how he's currently cocooned himself, but he makes sure Onni can hear it.]

[At Lalli's declaration that he's going to die, Onni rolls his eyes a little. It's fond enough, though, and he squats beside the bed so he's eye level with Lalli. His cousin looks sweaty and red-faced and miserable, and Onni's expression softens a little.]

I'll be right back.

[Standing up, he turns and heads back to his room, gathers up the thick fur cloak he'd been wearing when he came from home, and pours a glass of water to take back into Reynir's room. Setting the cup on the side table, he drapes the cloak over his cousin. It's warm and familiar and comforting, and it smells like home. Hopefully, it will do something for Lalli.]

I brought water.

[The cloak immediately gets assimilated into Lalli's growing tangle of blankets. He's starting to resemble a fluffy hedgehog. At least it's a sign he appreciates it, as much as Lalli appreciates anything.]

Mmnh.

[Water would be nice, but it would also require sitting up, which is absolutely not appealing right now. After a few moments of shifting around, though, he manages it, his head finally popping out of his impromptu nest. His hair is a mess and his eyes are bloodshot, but at least he's feeling well enough to be grumpy.

And at least he takes the water, though he mostly just sips at it petulantly.]

[There is, at least, some signs of movement and something resembling coherence from his cousin. He seems to appreciate the cloak, considering how he curls up underneath it with the sort of purring grumble that's so familiar from Lalli. A distress noise, but at least a noise, which means he's conscious and reacting.

A little of the worry settles, as much as it ever does, and Onni carefully helps support the weight of the cup while Lalli sips from it, ignoring any glares he might get for it. He's endured his fair share of Lalli's glares, and so he's mostly immune to their effect. While Lalli drinks, he tucks his other hand underneath the hem of his own shirt to warm it up so that when Lalli finishes his sulky drinking, it's less likely to make him shiver again.

His cousin's forehead is sticky with sweat, and so Onni carefully slides his fingers under Lalli's hair where it's stuck to it, pulling the lank strands away from his skin and tucking it back, watching for any signs of discomfort at the touch. Lalli, as he knows, isn't the biggest fan of touch, particularly not when he's overwhelmed and feeling miserable, so it's a difficult line to walk, trying to comfort him this way. It's a careful test to see if it's going to help Lalli right now, or just make him worse.]

[Lalli doesn't tense or pull back like Onni fears; in fact, he lets him do it. Part of it is simply because he's sick, but part of him does take comfort in the sensation of Onni's cool fingers combing through his hair. It stirs a distant memory of his mother doing the same thing when Lalli was ill as a child.

There's a lot about his mother he's forgotten over the years; he's been without her far longer than he'd been with her, at this point. But that, at least, he can remember.

Things go fuzzy after that. He sleeps most of the time. He's dimly aware of being carried somewhere at some point, but he doesn't know when or why and doesn't really care, either. He's mostly aware of sensation, and shifts in and out of consciousness and lucidity.

But he knows he's getting worse. Every time he comes to he can see Onni's face getting more and more haggard, more worried, more tired. It gets harder to keep down food, harder to swallow, harder to talk, harder to think. He has less and less energy to do anything but sit up occasionally. He feels like he's being cooked alive, and part of him wishes that if he's going to die--the stupidest death, but that's how it goes, sometimes--that it would just happen already. The hard truth is that someone who is this sick is just a drain on resources, and if he dies anyway then all of that just went to waste.

And Onni deserves better than to have to take care of a dead weight.]

[It's something of a relief, when Lalli doesn't cringe away from his touch, and so he keeps brushing his hair back, pulling it away from his face and pressing his hand against his forehead. It's easy to feel that his temperature is alarmingly high. What's even more worrying is that Lalli falls asleep while he's touching his hair. While Lalli sleeps, Onni drapes a cloth soaked in cool water across his forehead to try to draw some of the heat out of him, and goes about gathering a few things he'll need to start treating it.

Once he's done that, he carefully digs Lalli out from under the blankets and slides his arms under him, one under his shoulders and the other under his knees, lifting him easily and shifting his weight so Lalli's head falls against his shoulder. It's a movement that's as familiar as breathing, he knows Lalli's weight and how his limbs fall. Cradling him against his chest, humming softly to try to soothe any distress that being moved will cause, he carries him into the room they share so he can keep an eye on him even if he needs to nap later. Once he has him on the bed, he changes the cool cloth on his head and gets him changed into lighter clothing, one of Onni's T-shirts and a pair of soft light pajama pants, puts him under a light blanket and massages warmth into his feet, does a wet sock treatment and gets ginger tea with honey into him so he can sweat some of it out, makes sure he's drinking broth and water as often as he can.

It goes on that way, with Onni trying to break the fever, trying to keep Lalli hydrated and comfortable and as cool as he can be. Stroking his hair and singing him old, familiar lullabies while he cools his face and head and torso with wet cloths. He doesn't sleep much, and when he does it's with his head on the edge of Lalli's bed, for only an hour or two at a time, and he worries.

He worries more than he's worried since he'd first gone to Mora to contact Tuuri on the radio, worries that he's going to lose the last person in his family to another illness, the one person in his family he'd never had to worry about when it came to illness. But he can't let himself think too much about that, can't even let himself formulate the words that form the worry in his mind. He couldn't take it.]

[Maybe it's the lullabies, maybe it's the way Onni keeps stroking his hair, maybe it's just the sensation of falling in and out of dreams that causes the confusion. Onni's constant presence certainly creates a certain routine, and any disruption of it quickly becomes disturbing.

At some point he wakes up and he's alone. Maybe Onni had left to get a glass of water, or food, or who knows what--Lalli had been asleep, it was safe to do--but all Lalli knows is the comforting presence is gone and he doesn't know why. He shifts himself up so he can see around the room, but it's hard to focus and the movement makes him dizzy, so he has to hunker over until he gets his bearings, his hair in his face.]

Mom?

[He's hoarse, to the point he can barely hear himself. But he needs to know where she went; the idea of being alone right now is terrifying.]

[Onni is halfway through pouring hot water over grated ginger when he hears the thin voice coming from the bedroom. For a moment, he thinks he's heard wrong, imagined it. But no, that had definitely been Lalli's voice, calling for his mother.

Panic hits him like a spear in the chest, at first, because he's heard people dying and calling for their mothers while they did it, enough times that the two things are associated in his mind. As he turns, he accidentally knocks the mug over into the sink, ignores the clatter of porcelain on metal, and is in the room before he realizes he'd been running. Lalli is sitting up, swaying slightly, his shoulders hunched and hair covering his face - alive, and breathing and Onni feels a rush of relief that leaves him dizzy.

Crossing the room, he settles down beside his cousin and puts a steadying arm around his shoulders. Remembers, for a moment, his aunt Tuulikki and her cheerful face and the ridiculous nicknames she'd called Lalli. He remembers teasing Lalli by calling him 'little bunny' and feels homesick and nostalgic.]

I'm here. It's...it's Onni. Are you alright?

[The figure swimming in front of his vision looks like Onni, but that makes no sense. His mother always insisted on fussing over him whenever he showed the slightest signs of illness, because Grandma always took so much of his time, and it was the only chance she had to monopolize him.

It was annoying. But it was also kind of nice, so he let her do it. It makes no sense that she'd send Onni.

His head falls limply against Onni's shoulder, into the crook of his neck. He can feel his own sweat soak into Onni's coat and his own labored breathing fill his ears.]

Where's m...

[His voice trails off before he can finish the question, because that's not right. Of course his mother couldn't be here, it's impossible, because...

He just knows it isn't possible.]

[The moment his arm goes around Lalli's narrow shoulders, his cousin slumps into him, his face buried into his neck, and Onni can feel how hot he is. Like a little furnace, his breath coming rough and wheezy, his voice weak as he starts to ask where his mother is. Lalli cuts himself off halfway through the question, though, and Onni's eyes sink shut.

Gently, he rubs his hand against Lalli's back, over the damp fabric of the thin shirt he's wearing, stuck to his skin with sweat. For a moment, he feels like he might cry, because he knows what Lalli is feeling right now, that longing to be held by his mother again - he's felt it more often than he would like to admit, even recently. Exhaling softly, he lifts his free hand and pulls back Lalli's wet hair, tucks it behind his ear.]

She would be here if she could, Lalli. But for now it's just me.

[His voice is pitched soft, the way he might have talked to Lalli when he was young and distraught. Quiet and gentle and not overwhelming, with all the sharp edges scraped off.]

[Lalli closes his eyes and doesn't speak, the grief suddenly hitting him fresh. He and Onni are truly the only ones left of all of them, and very possibly soon it will just be Onni.

It isn't uncommon to die from illness. Maybe it is in Sweden or Denmark or other places that are sophisticated enough to have modern medicine, but in rural Finland it's all too frequent. Not for the first time it occurs to Lalli that there is every possibility he could die purely from unfortunate circumstance.

With how difficult it is for him to even breathe, it seems the universe agrees with him.]

Why does this keep happening to us?

[It slips out without his permission, but there is truth in his words. Tragedy keeps striking them over and over again, and maybe soon it will just be Onni. It will break him, probably, failing in this way. Lalli wishes he could save him from that, but it's no longer up to him.]

[Lalli doesn't speak, but Onni can feel the way his body trembles, and he closes his eyes, tilts his head down and presses his face against the top of Lalli's head, into his damp hair. His cousin smells like sweat and fever, familiar and animal and alive, and he keeps rubbing his back, listening to the way his lungs struggle as he tries to draw breath.

When Lalli asks why 'this' keeps happening to them, Onni shakes his head.]

Nothing is happening. You're sick, you have a fever, we've survived through this before.

[It's firm, he tries to put as much decisiveness into it as he can, but can't help the note of pleading that's there as well. They have survived sickness and fever before, he has, and Lalli has. He knows just as well as his cousin that if he lost Lalli to this, he couldn't keep going - both of their survival rests on Lalli living through this.]

Hmmm.

[It doesn't sound convinced. Somewhere in his feverish mind, and in honesty long before that, Lalli has already come to terms with the possibility of his death. He hadn't thought it would happen like this, but that doesn't mean it couldn't. It was always more likely that he'd die before Onni regardless in his line of work, with Onni staying safely behind the town perimeter.

But he can't say that, can he. Onni deserves to have some hope, even if it's temporary.]

Sorry I got sick. [He has to say it at some point.]

[Onni's insistence isn't backed up much by actual conviction - he's scared. Lalli is so warm, his face is burning, he's soaked with sweat, he's wheezing and stuffed up and Onni can only imagine how bad his headache must be. Right now, holding him like this is probably not the best course of action, but he can't seem to let go.

That's always been his worst failing; the inability to let go.

Swallowing down his dread, he shakes his head again when Lalli apologizes, and exhales a little huff of air. A laugh, but completely devoid of humour.]

You didn't get sick on purpose.

[It's an echo of what Lalli had said to him when he was sick before. For a moment, he just keeps rubbing Lalli's back, the spine and ribs so obvious under his skin.]

I need to cool you down.

[This time, it's more determined.]

Okay.

[It comes out as a whisper, barely even audible. He lets Onni arrange him wherever he wants, wherever he needs, without a breath of protest. He doesn't have the strength to protest, if he ever did, and part of him despairs that Onni is too desperate to acknowledge the reality staring him in the face.

There's no fight left in him, right now. He wonders what grandma would think to see him die like this. She was always so easy to disappoint.

Oh well. It is what it is, by now.]

[The fact that Lalli isn't protesting is a big problem. Onni isn't used to this, to Lalli giving up and failing to protest, letting himself be touched and arranged however is needed. That's what flips the switch in Onni's mind from despair to determination. One of them has to push through this to get both of them through it, that is something Onni is used to, used to taking his sister's hand and Lalli's hand and leading them to safety, no matter how tired and scared he is. So he takes a shaky breath, and he does it again.

Shifting a little, he starts peeling Lalli out of his shirt and pants, scoops him up in his arms and carries him into the bathroom, crouches and holds him in his lap, fills the tub with water that's just a little cooler than room temperature. Lalli is all skinny limbs and dead weight, and he feels far, far too light when Onni lowers him into the water, the sleeve of his shirt soaking as he keeps his arm around Lalli's shoulders so his head doesn't go under.]

Edited 2019-11-30 09:17 (UTC)

[Lalli's in a heavy doze as Onni works, practically asleep, so he doesn't react much whenever Onni has to jostle him to accomplish what he's doing. That is, until Onni actually puts him in the tub, at which point the shock is too much.

He's not strong enough to put up a fight, but he still tries as hard as he can, balking at the relatively cooler water and trying to twist past Onni so that he can pull himself back out.]

Nooooo.

[When Lalli revives a little and starts fighting back as he puts him in the water, Onni sighs deeply and pauses, supporting Lalli's weight but putting the bulk of his body between Lalli and his escape route.]

I know.

[It's calm but firm, and Onni just stays still and unmoved by the fightback. He knows how awful it must feel to be lowered into lukewarm water with a temperature like Lalli's, but it's necessary, and it's honestly a relief to have Lalli fighting again instead of that fatalistic giving up he'd been doing earlier.]

I am not letting you burn out, Lalli Saku Hotakainen.

[He doesn't have much energy at all to really struggle, and has to give up as soon as Onni makes any sort of effort to stop him. Just that much exertion makes him light headed, and he has to let Onni put him back in place as he breathes and waits for his head to stop spinning.

There is a lot he feels about this situation, but one thing is for sure: it sucks.

He's quiet for a bit as Onni finishes arranging the bath, his misery nearly palpable.]

It's hard.

[It's followed by a sigh, not directed anywhere in particular.]

I'm tired.

[The weight in his voice makes it clear he means every possible interpretation.]

[As he expected, it only takes a few seconds for Lalli to run out of energy for his fight to get out of the water, and once he settles, Onni goes back to helping lower him into the water. The arm of his shirt is already soaked, so he keeps it behind Lalli's shoulders, letting him rest his head and neck against it, while he soaks a clean cloth with the other hand and uses it to gently dab at Lalli's face. It will help cool him, and clean away some of the sticky sweat still on his cousin's forehead and cheeks and throat.]

I know, Lalli. But we've been through worse and we're still here.

[He uses the cloth to scoop some more water over Lalli's thin shoulders.]

I'll stay nearby so you can rest, and this will pass.

[Maybe it's the exhaustion that relaxes his filters. Maybe it's the delirium. It hardly matters why, really, as he closes his eyes and balances his head on the rim of the bath, on the edge of unconsciousness.

He lets loose a long, deep breath, and settles.]

How do you know?

[How do you know it will pass.

After all, the world is a terrible place.]

[When Lalli asks how he knows that this is going to pass, Onni's stomach clenches up like a fist and he closes his eyes for just a moment. Lalli closes his too, resting his head against the tub and looking barely conscious, and Onni takes a deep breath, clenches his teeth for a moment and then exhales.

The world is a terrible place. But losing Lalli is something he can't tolerate. Something he couldn't survive. So there's no other option in his mind, it has to pass.]

Because even if it means not sleeping for a week to watch you and dipping you in ice water, I won't let it take you.

[Lalli's honestly not even keeping track of the conversation anymore; he's almost asleep again. All he can do is respond to the most recent thing Onni has said.]

But you need to sleep.

[As if to demonstrate the point, he's unconscious as soon as he says the last word.]

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