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

Oh.

[Not a good thing to hear. She's already seen the damage he's able to cause simply by losing his temper, and it isn't a comfortable thing to know that he's harmed someone with it.

But he doesn't look happy about it. The Carlisle she knew would not have been happy about it either, so there is a small reassurance in that.]

You didn't mean to. [She surmises, glancing down at his hands.] Did you lose control?

[She surmises correctly, but he doesn't nod, his eyes affixed on his ruined hands.]

I pushed myself too far. I should have known I would. I did know I would, and I did it anyway.

[Poison watches him quietly, though she's sure her silence is almost physically painful for him. She lifts a hand, as if to reach out to him, then thinks better of it and lets her arm drop again.

A quiet sigh puffs out through her nose, and she shakes her head. What a mess.]

What were you trying to do?

[Yes, just what was he trying to do? Pretend he's still the man he once was? Prove to himself that he still has value?]

I was asked to heal a man who was badly wounded. I knew I could, but- but it caused my energies to fluctuate wildly. Dangerously.

I see...

[Just trying to help.

And of course he would, because that's just the kind of person he is and the kind of person she would expect him to be, no matter what he looked like or what had happened to him.]

Maybe you shouldn't have done that. [She sighs.] Go on. What happened next??

[His entire frame stiffens as she remarks on his poor decision, as though he's preparing to be chastised. He did plenty of that to himself before others did, and he's not eager to hear more about what an idiot and a failure he was.

Thankfully, Poison just sighs and prompts him to continue, so he does, the tension lingering in his shoulders.] I unknowingly pulled energy from the trees around us. I did not know until I looked around, only to find they were already dead, lines of rot leading to each one and tethering them to me.

[And that part brings him more visible discomfort. It could have been Kieran, or Ben, or his friend Pratt rather than the trees. Did he unconsciously avoid draining energy from them? Or was it just pure, blind luck that they remained relatively unharmed by the process?]

[The young woman has the feeling that he's already chastised himself enough and needs no further telling off from her. Besides, not doing that is surely the best way to keep him talking, when the last time they bickered caused him to clam up entirely and she's in no state to follow him should he decide to walk away.

She thinks about what he says. It doesn't sound like how his magic used to work, but...]

Should you be able to heal, as you are? [It's a puzzle, and enough of one to bring a bit of light back into her eyes as her mind turns it over.]

It sounds like you had to... compensate. For something you didn't have.

I'm not sure, but I have my guesses.

[And none of them sound good. He wrings his fingers as he continues.]

Restorative magic -- reparation -- is the same magic used for necromancy. They are two sides of the same coin, yet volatile and incompatible with one another. The undead should not be capable of wielding such magic, and yet, I am. I... assume my lifetime spent mastering the healing arts allows me to use it even in death.

[His assumption isn't far off, but he has no way of knowing for certain. His eyes flick to her, his brow knotted with worry.]

But in channeling it, I disrupted the energies that keep me animated. They needed to be balanced, and I acted instinctively to achieve that.

[And there's something in the thought of that being his natural reflex now that troubles him the most; his fingers are wound so tight that the skeletal quality of his hands is visible through his gloves, the fabric pulled taut to the bones beneath.]

Carlisle--

[She winces when she straightens herself up, putting her back against the head of the bed. Every movement makes her head spin, but it only lasts a moment or two before the usual sharpness is back in her eyes. Poison isn't going to pity him, because she doesn't think that he wants that and even if he did, it isn't what he needs.

Poison sighs.]

You're really smart. I know you are. [So smart. But sometimes also the dumbest smart person she knows.]

But has anyone ever seen anything like you? You didn't even think that this could happen.

[Carlisle's eyes dart to Poison as she winces, his concern for her evident despite his internal worries; it bubbles right to the surface as it always has, whether alive or undead. He may not feel he's the same person -- or a person at all -- but his behavior is far more indicative of the truth than his opinion. He is definitely a very smart, but very dumb person at times.

He relaxes a hair once she sits against the bed, and he's reassured of her relative health; he rests his hands on his legs as he tries not to wring them again.]

I am a conundrum of everything I know. There are undeads capable of magic, but not of healing -- never of healing, as the magic for reparation is the antithesis of what keeps them- keeps me animated. They have neither the awareness for it, nor the ability to wield such energies, and yet... here I am, aware and able.

And why am I aware? [His voice picks up just a hair in tempo and volume, the bridge of his nose wrinkling.] Why is it that I rose as a Revenant, and regained my consciousness years later? Would all Revenants awaken eventually as I have? Or am I just- just some awful anomaly?

[He pulls in a breath, trying to keep himself calm; he's only partially successful, but at least he's trying.]

[Not to worry, Carlisle, she'll be right as rain soon enough. Her focus is on the person in front of her rather than her own discomfort and that suits her very well indeed for the moment.]

Do all Revenants become Revenants because of a curse like yours?

[When he'd talked about it, it had always sounded like something unique to him. But he'd never known that he would come back like this, in full control of his faculties...

She really can't imagine how it must feel.]

I don't know that, either. N- not for certain. Revenants, they- no one knows exactly where they come from. They are blessedly rare, and it has always been assumed they were raised by only the most powerful of necromancers. Knowing now that it is the twice-cursed who rise as Revenants... it explains their rarity. We burn their bodies- er, they burn our bodies, those afflicted.

But... [He shifts uncomfortably.] I have never heard of an aware Revenant, and I wonder if the qualities that make me an aberration even among the undead have something to do with it.

[She studies him while he speaks. There's so much of the person in front of her that she can link back to the Carlisle that she knew, and it makes her chest ache to know that there's a version of him that was never allowed to be happy. He deserved better than to go his whole life thinking he was a monster.]

So you're... unique. [In a horrible, terrible way.]

What qualities make you different?

I'm a healer, and—

[Wait. She knows about his curse, but does she know what he can do as a result? Does she know how he can cripple the will of another individual, bending them to obey his own? Does she know that that's what happened to the people of Bear Den? How much did the other him know? How much did he tell her? She would judge him, wouldn't she? She should -- he judges himself for it.

He hesitates for a second, unable to bring himself to speak of it. He continues with what is technically the truth, albeit incomplete.]

A- and healing, it's... the energy for healing is the same as necromancy, the opposite side of the coin. As I was adept at manipulating that energy toward one end, so would I be at the other, especially as a Revenant capable of wielding magic.

[She catches that hesitation because Carlisle does not do a good job of hiding it, but she isn't sure what it's for. Her curiosity is only for what makes him different to other revenants like him, given that he is the only one that she knows.

But there is still a great deal that he never told her. A lot that he didn't know, when they knew each other before.

She listens, and there's a flicker of something like doubt on her face - something that tells of her realising he's hiding something, but she at least has the manners and tact to not point it out.]

So... other revenants wouldn't have been healers before.

No. They- they couldn't be. As I said, the energy that keeps me animated is counteracted by that used to heal. An undead shouldn't be capable of healing at all, and even if they were, they would not have the cognizance for it. Their energies, what ones they could wield, would instead shift toward the necrotic, as mine have.
And—

[More uncomfortable shifting, his eyes back on his lap.]

And it's not merely rotting away walls or ruining skin. It's raising the undead.

No, that... that's not what I meant.

[This whole thing is making him uneasy, she can tell, but she's still so convinced that the person sitting in front of her is not as far removed from the person she used to know as he would probably believe.

She wants to learn, though, about the person he is now.]

Were they healers before they were revenants at all. Like you were.

I don't know. Perhaps, but- but one would have had to have been a healer and twice-cursed for it to be possible, and even then, it would be an unlikely situation. Revenants are terrible oddities, undeads who retain the abilities they did in life, even magic. While restorative magic is commonly practiced by anyone with even a hint of magical ability, true healers of my caliber are rare.

[Given how self-deprecating Carlisle can be, he must have really been an exceptional healer to have actually taken pride in his work. He often did consider it to be his true calling, his singular purpose in life -- and being stripped of that purpose has undeniably shaken him.]

[She smiles when she hears that. It makes a change to hear him not saying something negative about himself.

And she notes that he says 'are', not 'were'.]

Maybe... that had something to do with it. Why you can still do it now.

That is what I assume, though that does not answer why I am aware now. Why it is I awakened in this form to be tormented by what I have done.

[And that brings him back to the question of if he's the only Revenant who would awaken like that. He's never heard of any others, though given how uncommon they are, how rare the right combination of traits and talents and curse-bound gifts would have to be to give him his particular set of skills—

There has to be a reason for it; it can't all just be unfortunate coincidence, can it?]

[There has to be something to make it make sense. Something about him - or his curse - that's different and what makes him what he is. Could it have been his advanced healing abilities? Something peculiar about the way he was curse, or how long he lived after it finally, completely took effect?

It's an ample distraction from Poison's current predicament, and she furrows her brow while she thinks through it.]

... Where did the curse start? Where does it come from?

It afflicts each twice-cursed differently, its manifestation varying from person to person. Some say it is the result of coming so close to death that one catches a glimpse of the land beyond living, their minds and bodies scarred from the experience. Some say it is for wasting a god's time, inconveniencing him by having him come to retrieve their soul, only to not have died after all. Some say the afflicted are poisoned from birth, and that what we perceive to be a curse is something they've had within them all along. There are many theories, but no one truly knows where it comes from.

[His brow knits.]

Did the other me not tell you this? You knew I was cursed, and what I would become.

Edited 2020-01-20 00:48 (UTC)

You didn't like to talk about it too much. There's a lot I didn't get to ask.

[She liked Carlisle then, as she does now, and she hadn't wanted to push him too far. It had obviously been a sore topic, and the girl had not needed to press for more information to understand that.]

But I suppose it's not surprising that no one knows where it comes from. Do you have science where you come from? I don't.

We do, though it is very different from the science here. More alchemical in nature, and less... technological. I am still adjusting.

[And if his previous self never fully acclimating to technology is a sign, he'll be adjusting for a long time. His glowing eyes flick her way.]

How much did I know? About... this.

[A vague gesture toward him.]

[She nods, understanding entirely. It's much the same for her, and alchemy is nothing like the science and technology that she has learned of since she began this journey.

When he asks his question, she closes her eyes in thought and lets out a slow breath through her nose.]

You knew that the curse would mean you'd become a revenant. [She says carefully, rummaging through memories of conversations.] There was this... tar, that came out of you. You didn't know where it came from, only where it was said to come from. [Her large violet eyes open, and she looks at him.]

But you didn't know that you'd ever be aware of yourself again. I'm sure you didn't know that.

november 2019. welcome to the void.

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cw: vague suicidal ideation

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