december 2019. welcome to the void.

[modblob]

Who: Everyone in Anchor.
What: Sixth Introductory Mingle
When: The Month of December 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. the generic holiday cheer prompt.

It's a dark, quiet, uneventful night. Only those up and about in the wee hours will notice something odd starting in the park.

It's snowing.

The phenomenon seems to be coming from a small bank of unmoving clouds hanging suspended above the trees and lake. A cloud that, upon closer inspection by any scientists in the room, appears to be made of harmless nanites whose sole purpose is to unleash a cheery, blustery kind of weather that remains mostly contained to the park.

Some bots are out serving hot chocolate, cider, flavored snow cones, and other small baked treats. Others are building a solid-looking bit of scaffolding that the snow is rapidly turning into a sledding ramp. In fact, there are sleds ready and waiting at the foot of the slide. The smaller ponds have frozen over in a sharp cold snap that came with the nanites' release, and there are other bots handing out ice skates - careful, though, because one of them is a chef bot and he's made the blades of the skates ridiculously sharp. At least they'll glide well?

Around the middle of the day, the intercoms squeal loudly, crackle, and start pouring generic seasonal music out into the air. Is it for Hanukkah? Christmas? Kwanzaa? Some strange holiday no one has heard of? Who knows, since half of it is in alien languages, but man, it sure is peppy! And kind of annoying after a while! Maybe someone should hack the system and change the music up?

b. the body heat trope prompt.

As the day wears on toward evening, the nanite winter storm starts to gather a little more force, sending cold seeping through the halls of Anchor. There are pockets of warmth here and there - notably, for once, the agricultural areas are largely unaffected thanks to their temperature regulators--but most of Anchor has a wintery chill, and snow is starting to bluster across the levels from bottom to top. Temperatures continue to drop when the suns go down.

The bots are out being helpful, though they can't stop the storm. They're rolling around handing out blankets and thermoses of warm drinks. Unfortunately, it's one blanket and one thermos per two people. Better get cosy - it's going to be a long, cold night!

c. the terrifying monster attack prompt.

The cold has woken up some creatures that have been slumbering away in one of the sealed-off areas of the labs. They couldn't get through the door that kept them caged, but they sure could freeze the windows and escape that way when they got cold enough to break. The little critters make a beeline for the park, prepared to wreak havoc-

If eating snow and ice and rolling snow into tiny balls for meal stockpiles is havoc.

These little creatures look conspicuously like the western dragons of Earth, though most are no bigger than a person's forearm. Their wings - some strange shade of white that sparkles when they move - seem largely decorative. They use them to communicate, to posture, and to keep themselves balanced when they rear up on their hind legs, but none of them appear able to fly. They're a mix of colors, blue and silver and white, some of them with a variety of shades swirling down their bodies, others with one color on their bellies and contrasting colors on their back and head. Some have splotches, or speckles, or tiger stripes of blue. They breathe steam and can freeze things with their clawed forepaws.

Also, if you feed them a flavored snow cone, they will follow you forever. No, really. You'll have yourself an undyingly loyal new pet.

Navigation.

Comments

Peter Parker | OTA

[itsnotaonesie]

the generic holiday cheer prompt:

The last time Peter had experienced "winter", he'd been stuck on a barren ice planet where he had to fight giant alien mammoths, endured a two week expedition out into the frozen wasteland, and made an emotionally crippling discovery about some weird snail aliens, and fell into a weird depression funk where he just kind of avoided people for a while. It had been busy as fuck, in other words, and Peter hadn't exactly had a chance to actually enjoy the season. Now he had that chance, but he is far more interested in whatever's causing the snow than the snow itself.

So, like the nerd that he is, he can be found hanging upside down from a strand of web from a branch of the tallest tree he can find and taking readings of the ~mysterious~ snow clouds with some sciency looking device he found in the lab this one time. He's already determined that it's nanomachines, but surely there are better things that the nanomachines could be doing right now, like repairing the goddamn heating system or whatever is going on God it's always something around here.

When he's not doing that he's straight up stealing an entire tray of baked goodies from one of the robots and retreating back to his branch, still hanging upside down from his web, just out of reach of the cranky, flailing robot. Eat shit robot, these are Peter's cookies now.

the body heat trope prompt:

He can't spend the entire day in bed buried in cats and blankets and snuggling with Poison. Sometimes you gotta go out and freeze your ass off for a while.

Except that Peter's finally repaired the heating system in his suit, so he's just out doing maintenance in skin tight spandex like it's the most normal thing in the universe. It doesn't stop the robots from shoving him at someone and then then shoving a blanket and thermos at the pair, though. Warm blanket, warm thermos, warm Spider-Man, come get all toasty before Peter grabs this thermos and bails to go overwork himself some more.

the wildcard prompt:

throw a snowball at this fool you know you want to

Holiday Cheer

[theweakhavepurpose]

"Did you bring enough to share with the class?" Pratt is actually enjoying this. Sure it's freezing, but he has hot chocolate with marshmallows in it (and maybe also chocolate sauce), and he's wearing a parka that one of the helpful robots shoved him into. Honestly this is great. There's snow and cookies and food and he's not really freezing to death because he has a giant wolf that insists on sleeping next to him and raising the temp of the entire bedroom to sweltering.

Granted Pratt can't reach that tray of cookies that Peter has up there, but he can smell them. "What's the verdict? Is the snow somehow toxic? Are we going to all become ice zombies from this?"

[itsnotaonesie]

God everybody needs a wolf like that.

"We're good, I'm not detecting any zombie snow. I can't figure out why the nanomachines are doing this, but part of me just doesn't really give a shit." There are so many other things to care about that are way more important. Like trying to figure out how to raise the temperature again, and also cookies. Peter drops his ass right out of this tree, managing not to spill a single cookie even after doing a sick flip and landing on the ground next to Pratt. Mad spider skills, y'all.

"I probably could eat all of these, but I shouldn't. Here." Eat some cookies Pratt, you know you want to.

[theweakhavepurpose]

Free with membership to the cult!

"Maybe they're bored. Do robots get bored?" Pratt has experienced his first Roomba while being here, he's not well versed in the mechanical ways.

"Show off." But Pratt would definitely do the same if he had sick spider skills. Which he doesn't. He mostly has boring Deputy skills, and some leet Halo skills, neither of which are really being put to good use here.

If ever there's an Anchor run to a box canyon outside the bubble: Legendary All Skulls On, he is your man. But until then he's going to take a cookie and start munching because he runs on sugar and caffeine.

"You know it might be awesome if we could reprogram these clouds to rain and send them up to the agriculture area. Better than sprinklers if we can point a remote at a cloud and turn the rain on."

[itsnotaonesie]

He's definitely showing off, just look at his dumb nerd grin.

"My guess is it's more of a programmed setting than a bunch of nanomachines getting bored, just something to make this place feel a little more like home. In a shitty, wintry sort of way."

At least here there isn't any traffic, so nobody needs to worry about the shitty winter drivers or icy roads. Small victories.

"I didn't even realize that they were able to do something like this. I'm gonna have to look into it, but that's probably something we can do."

[theweakhavepurpose]

"I mean it's sorta nostalgic. They're trying, but it's not the same." And considering how everything else in this place goes he'd catch a thirty pound fish that had beefy arms and could fly and jumped out of the water and attacked everything.

"First winter I'm not going to have to airlift out some idiot who went ice fishing in a blizzard. Guess that's kind of nice."

Not that he has a helicopter here, but that was his life every winter prior.

[itsnotaonesie]

What are you talking about that sounds like the best fish ever. I want to catch that fish in real life.

"Y'know, in that case I guess this isn't so bad. Gotta say though, you make Montana sound way more interesting than I ever thought it would be."

[theweakhavepurpose]

"Well I'm only telling you the interesting stuff, and usually the terrible things. There's not a lot to say about the months where literally nothing happens and the only calls I get are from the trailer park where someone is complaining that their neighbor is watching Married With Children too loud." And it's times like that he really regrets joining the police force. Sure the pay was good and 80% of the time he didn't have to do much but drive around and play Pokemon Go, but then there was dealing with people who thought that their ex-husband's dog pooping on the lawn was a lethal offense and went after them with a shotgun.

"I've never understood ice fishing. Fishing is relaxing, you sit by the lake and drink some beer and wait for fish to show up. But with ice fishing you have to punch a hole in the lake, hope that you don't fall through it, and then freeze your ass off for hours."

[itsnotaonesie]

"Hell, I don't even get the point of regular fishing, but that's probably just because I'm from New York." Look sitting by some water and waiting on fish does not sound like a super fun time at all, but then this is the kid who used to regularly jump off of buildings and though of that as relaxing, so.

"I still think I might wanna visit Montana some time. I'll look totally out of place, but that's me pretty much anywhere I go, so."

Body Heat

[birdical]

Having not yet claimed a room for herself, Elleru usually spends her nights in the park in her natural form; however, it's cold there. And it's cold in the upper levels. And in the mess hall. The barracks hallways. It's cold just about everywhere, and if there's one thing Elleru is not terribly fond of, it's the cold. Maybe it's the fact her backside only has a thin layer of fur covering it, the majority of her tail completely bare; maybe it's that her people live in burrows, the ground keeping them safe from the winter chill.

Whatever the exact reason, she's just a hair miserable as she lies in the lobby of the spa, her large frame (all but her tail) covered by three large blankets, six thermoses standing nearby like inanimate attendants. Apparently, the robots keep tossing blankets and drinks her way -- and now, they've shoved a stranger, as well.

[itsnotaonesie]

Peter's come to find that it's easier to just let the robots put him wherever they want him, and then wait for them to leave before he just goes about his business. Less headache and less robots to repair that way. He was going to do the same thing here, but then the robots shove him into the spa lobby with a big fucking critter, and his curiosity gets the better of him. He has got to check this shit out.

"Whoa, nobody told me we had a griffin! Man, I really have to stop cooping myself up in the lab."

He's inching closer to investigate the poor, very cold looking whatever this is.

[birdical]

Having been huddled so long in the desolate spa with only blankets and robots for company, Elleru is genuinely surprised when she suddenly has company. She thought briefly she recognized the voice, but when she lifts her great head from the floor, one of the blankets draped over her like a hood, she finds it's someone she doesn't know. His outfit is certainly... interesting. Perhaps it is to keep him warm -- she can't blame him for that.

Normally, she would be cautious about being seen in her natural form, even in another world where no one has heard of or is hunting the kaulahren; she would be apprehensive about speaking in front of others while out of her upright guise, so sure the sight of a talking beast (or what uprights may likely assume is a mere beast) would frighten some of the individuals she's met in Anchor. She wants people to believe she's just like them, and nothing more.

Unfortunately, most of that goes right out the window with her immediate excitement.

"You are here to fix the baths? They are frozen over!"

[itsnotaonesie]

OH, the griffin is people. COOL. Peter pulls his mask off and approaches way less cautiously since this is someone he can talk to and not just some very cool looking animal. Nothing surprises him anymore, man.

"Oh, um, no? I think they stuck me in here to keep you warm, if I had to guess. I can definitely look at the baths, though. Unless there's some kind of programming that I can't override, I should at least be able to get one of these up and running for you."

He starts heading towards one of the baths to do just that, but then pauses and turns his attention back to that beaked critter, "Y'know, you sound really familiar."

[birdical]

The costumed man replies, and Elleru immediately realizes that her exuberance got the better of her; her neck scrunches in, her ears flattening as she buries her beak in the fluff of her chest in what is likely an expression of embarrassment. This is the second upright she's spoken in front of while in her natural form, and once he pulls his mask off, she realizes this is one she knows.

She warbles uncomfortably. Unwilling to outright lie even when she may be caught for what she is, she avoids the question entirely. "They were once so warm. I was disappointed to find they are not working when it is so cold."

[itsnotaonesie]

Oh my Goooood, the big griffin is so cute thoooough. He wants to pat her head, but that would probably be rude. Instead he's gonna start fiddling with the controls of one of the spa baths,

"Nothing sounds better than hopping into a hot bath right now, not gonna lie. I don't know if it was the cold that broke them, though. Seems to be stuff shutting down all over the place. I hear the agricultural level is still warm, though." Which is good, because they don't need all the food dying too.

[birdical]

"Ag-ree-cul—" she starts, parsing out the word syllable by syllable before realizing what he means, continuing, "ah, the farm. Yes, it is warmer there, but I was hoping to bathe here. It is closer to the people, you see."

She means the barracks. It's lonely in the agricultural level, okay.

[itsnotaonesie]

"Oh, yeah, that's fair. I'd prefer to be around everyone too."

He's distracted for a minute by the spa controls, turns out that he can't make this thing do jack shit because this goddamn station has a mind of it's own. He's going to have to see if Qubit can reprogram some of this shit later, but for now, he just shrugs.

"Well, nothing's broken, but the computers are gonna be stuck like this for a while, it looks like. I know it's not much, but I can sit with you for a while? I'm not very big, but this suit has a built in heater so I could probably warm you up a bit."

holiday cheer

[writtendestiny]

There are a limited number of people who could be up in a tree to avoid a robot, Poison thinks (though it could just be that the robot is getting angry at nothing, and she wouldn't be surprised) and she uses the distraction to walk quietly up behind the robot, open a panel and tweak something inside that makes it very suddenly decide it has something better to do.

It pointedly gives her a hot chocolate before trundling off along the path.

"Peter, don't torment the robots," she admonishes, looking up at him with clear amusement in her eyes. "What are you doing up there?"

[itsnotaonesie]

Oh my God she's learned so much about the robots, Peter is super proud of her. He's also dropping out of that tree with a tray of cookies, offering some to her with his dorkiest grin.

"Aside form tormenting the robot, I was trying to figure out what was up with the random snow clouds. Turns out it's just nanomachines."

[writtendestiny]

"Oh." She's not sure if she likes that, but whether she likes it or not is going to be entirely irrelevant to whether or not it continues. Poison looks suspiciously up at the clouds as she takes a cookie and dips it into her hot chocolate.

"Is this all they're going to do?"

Or should they start to expect molten metal to start raining from the sky when something inevitably goes wrong?

[itsnotaonesie]

"I think so, yeah. They seem to be following some kind of... I dunno, pre-programmed seasonal cycle thing? It's a little annoying, but I think it'll just stop on it's own once it's run it's cycle."

And if it starts raining molten metal, they can figure out what to do about that later.

"Nice work on that robot, by the way."

[writtendestiny]

"Oh--"

She watches the server bot trundling away to offer its services to the next person that wanders into its path, and gives a small, modest shrug. "I've been learning how they work. Cybertronians were much more complex."

With these, it's a simple matter of flicking a switch or putting a small static shock to the right part of a system. In time, she may be able to reprogram one or even build one of her own.

[itsnotaonesie]

"Oh, I'm sure. The Cybertronians were like living people, they just happened to be made out of metal. It makes sense that they'd be super complex."

Is it weird that Peter really wants to get all up in the guts of a Cybertronian and fiddle with their insides? Kind of??? He's a fucking mad scientist isn't he.

[writtendestiny]

Kind of, but Poison had always found watching Ratchet work to be morbidly interesting. There's no squeamishness attached to looking inside robotic workings when blood might be the thing that makes your knees start to wobble.

"It was always kind of nice, hanging around with them. I think I know more about their laws than some of them did."

[itsnotaonesie]

That is very true and Peter would definitely agree that working on machines was way less stressful than working on anything made of blood and skin.

"See, I only met two Cybertronians in Hadriel, but that still doesn't surprise me. You're really smart, and they're kind of disasters."