Mods (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
modblob) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
redshiftlogs2020-01-01 03:38 pm
modblob) wrote in redshiftlogs2020-01-01 03:38 pm
Entry tags:
- !mod post: intro mingle,
- asoiaf: arya stark,
- assassin's creed: ratonhnhakéton,
- dctv: mick rory,
- ffxv: noctis lucis caelum,
- hunger games: finnick odair,
- marble hornets: brian thomas,
- mcu: peter parker,
- original: athena parker,
- original: carlisle longinmouth,
- overwatch: hanzo shimada,
- red dead redemption: charles smith,
- red dead redemption: kieran duffy,
- samurai jack: scaramouche,
- ssss: onni hotakainen,
- star wars: kylo ren,
- tales of symphonia: zelos wilder,
- umbrella academy: ben hargreeves
january 2020. welcome to the void.
Who: Everyone in Anchor.
What: Seventh Introductory Mingle
When: The Month of January 2020
Where: Around and outside the city.
Warnings: Please add any warnings in the subject lines.
What: Seventh Introductory Mingle
When: The Month of January 2020
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. champagne supernova.
Normally, the changes in the sky are subtle, happening between glances or over the course of days.
That's not the case now, when the bright sky with its three suns is wiped away in an explosion of blue light, right at sunrise on the morning of January 1st. The light pulses across the sky in uneven blazes, sending out lattices of what might be lightning or something worse. There's no moon. No brightness. Just this lightning-storm brilliance in space, shedding little light on the world below.
And the suns don't come back on. As the day wears on, the supernova brightness in the sky starts to fade out and no new light appears. The sky is static and black, with no stars, no moons, no suns. The mild rolling blackouts that started with the opening of the relaxation room intensify with the sudden loss of solar power, as the backup systems try to compensate for the increased use of power.
For a moment, power goes out in Anchor entirely, leaving the place plunged into darkness.
The darkness doesn't last. Thanks to those generators everyone worked so hard to sort out, the backup systems struggle back to life, keeping the lights on and the bar, kitchen, and agricultural supports open, but there are some things that the limited power just can't cover.
That's not the case now, when the bright sky with its three suns is wiped away in an explosion of blue light, right at sunrise on the morning of January 1st. The light pulses across the sky in uneven blazes, sending out lattices of what might be lightning or something worse. There's no moon. No brightness. Just this lightning-storm brilliance in space, shedding little light on the world below.
And the suns don't come back on. As the day wears on, the supernova brightness in the sky starts to fade out and no new light appears. The sky is static and black, with no stars, no moons, no suns. The mild rolling blackouts that started with the opening of the relaxation room intensify with the sudden loss of solar power, as the backup systems try to compensate for the increased use of power.
For a moment, power goes out in Anchor entirely, leaving the place plunged into darkness.
The darkness doesn't last. Thanks to those generators everyone worked so hard to sort out, the backup systems struggle back to life, keeping the lights on and the bar, kitchen, and agricultural supports open, but there are some things that the limited power just can't cover.
b. tower of babelfish.
The first, and perhaps the most noticeable system to start failing, are the auto-translation programs. While not affecting every area in Anchor equally, communication between those who speak different languages is going to be a lot more difficult. The effects are spotty, coming and going, sometimes completely failing, leaving only people's naturally-spoken languages available. Sometimes it just struggles, making conversations sound a lot more like babelfish translations than recognizable speech. People themselves seem to be affected differently by the translation struggles, depending on who and where they are. There's no rhyme or reason to when and how it fails. But the problem persists through most of the month.
c. the hidden passage.
The second system failure is harder to spot.
At the end of what seemed to be a maintenance hallway, a set of doors have appeared from behind what used to be a shielded hologram of a dead end. The doors stick out from their surroundings: thick metal, barred heavily from the outside. A clear attempt to keep something locked away inside, not to keep people from entering.
For those adventurous enough, or foolish enough, to wrestle the locks open, a problem will reveal itself. A short flight of stairs, leading down into an area flooded by murky water. It's hard to see more than branching halls down below.
Those who choose to brave the water will find a hallway lined with bulkheads and sealed doorways, all guarding rooms that could be accessed with the right combination of smarts and brute force. It's the question of what would be ruined by the water if the doors are opened that might give people pause. What kind of secrets could be wiped out or destroyed if the doors are forced and the water passes through the bulkheads? Can the water be drained? How?
But there is one room open, or mostly open, where the bulkhead doors didn't quite manage to seal when the area flooded. It'll be a squeeze, for bigger characters, but the flooded room beyond contains artifacts preserved behind glass - strange medallions, strings of glowing beads, broken sceptres, arrows fletched with feathers from creatures no one has ever seen before.
Only one object isn't sealed away. It's a handful of small orbs, with shifting colors, held in place by a shield array that still seems to function, for the most part. They can be touched, can even be removed from the stand with the right know-how or a willingness to smash stuff.
But once an orb is touched, the colors start to spin more rapidly. The more it's handled, the brighter and faster the colors shift. Whether it takes hold immediately or not is up to you, but those who handled the orb will find the bright colors start to glow under the surface of their skin, in the shape of veins, glowing bright for a few minutes before fading. And those people bring a different kind of contagion back with them to the surface. Memory loss, communicated from one person to the next via contact. It can be partial or complete, or not happen to your character at all - they can be an unwitting "carrier" of the effects, passing it on without experiencing the losses themselves. The loss can last from hours to weeks, with carriers being "infected" for the duration of that time.
It also leaves behind magical traces, ones that don't fade after memories return. The cleverest might start to wonder if it wasn't a kind of inoculation, though against what, it remains to be seen.
At the end of what seemed to be a maintenance hallway, a set of doors have appeared from behind what used to be a shielded hologram of a dead end. The doors stick out from their surroundings: thick metal, barred heavily from the outside. A clear attempt to keep something locked away inside, not to keep people from entering.
For those adventurous enough, or foolish enough, to wrestle the locks open, a problem will reveal itself. A short flight of stairs, leading down into an area flooded by murky water. It's hard to see more than branching halls down below.
Those who choose to brave the water will find a hallway lined with bulkheads and sealed doorways, all guarding rooms that could be accessed with the right combination of smarts and brute force. It's the question of what would be ruined by the water if the doors are opened that might give people pause. What kind of secrets could be wiped out or destroyed if the doors are forced and the water passes through the bulkheads? Can the water be drained? How?
But there is one room open, or mostly open, where the bulkhead doors didn't quite manage to seal when the area flooded. It'll be a squeeze, for bigger characters, but the flooded room beyond contains artifacts preserved behind glass - strange medallions, strings of glowing beads, broken sceptres, arrows fletched with feathers from creatures no one has ever seen before.
Only one object isn't sealed away. It's a handful of small orbs, with shifting colors, held in place by a shield array that still seems to function, for the most part. They can be touched, can even be removed from the stand with the right know-how or a willingness to smash stuff.
But once an orb is touched, the colors start to spin more rapidly. The more it's handled, the brighter and faster the colors shift. Whether it takes hold immediately or not is up to you, but those who handled the orb will find the bright colors start to glow under the surface of their skin, in the shape of veins, glowing bright for a few minutes before fading. And those people bring a different kind of contagion back with them to the surface. Memory loss, communicated from one person to the next via contact. It can be partial or complete, or not happen to your character at all - they can be an unwitting "carrier" of the effects, passing it on without experiencing the losses themselves. The loss can last from hours to weeks, with carriers being "infected" for the duration of that time.
It also leaves behind magical traces, ones that don't fade after memories return. The cleverest might start to wonder if it wasn't a kind of inoculation, though against what, it remains to be seen.
no subject
They're so long and dense and depressing! Reading them is hard work. Uh, no offense.
[ As if he remembers enough to be offended... At his last question, though, she looks back at him sympathetically and nods. Obviously she can't say for sure, but - ]
Yeah, I think so! I mean, when I first got here, I'd forgotten a whole year of my life, sort of. And you helped me remember it. Hey, maybe now I'll even be able to return the favor.
no subject
[ But though Ben searches his mind and remembers the names of a few authors and some books, the general themes of them and what might be appealing, he doesn't remember why any of that matters to him. What kind of person likes depressing books! Is he a depressing person? A depressed person? ]
I would say my life must be really dull to have gotten into big, difficult books in the first place, but you also said I'm from a big family and I was a freaking superhero, which I'm not sure I believe, so maybe not?
[ Before he can pick at that thread any longer, however, Ami mentions that she had a run-in with amnesia before, and that Ben had helped somehow. He turns to her quickly, eyebrows raised. ]
I did that? Seriously? What was- how did you forget? Do you think this is the same thing, now? Is there some... some influence making people forget things and no one has stopped it?
[ Not a BAD guess, all in all... ]
no subject
It's not too surprising that he doesn't quite believe her on the superhero thing. After all, if someone had told her about Aradia before she remembered, she would have had a hard time believing them, too. BUT ANYWAY... ]
[ She shakes her head apologetically. ] Well, no, I know it's not the same thing. Mine didn't have anything to do with Anchor, it was already - I'm kind of a special case, I guess? It's a long story. I just meant, you know, there's a precedent! I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explanation, you'll see.
no subject
She seems to really mean it, when she says that there must be an explanation. Ben wants her to be right. He wants to just believe it will all be okay. But he can't seem to force himself to relax, to trust that things will go well. ]
I wouldn't mind hearing it. Even if it's a long story.
[ Ben gives a laugh that doesn't quite hide the anxiety underneath it, adds: ]
Give me a bit of hope, you know.
[ Even he can hear the unease there, and he winces at it. Is he going to be like this the whole time until he remembers everything? Or will he stay this way even then? What if he's a terrible person and just doesn't remember it? Obviously, Ami is nice and seems to like him, but she might have awful taste, he doesn't know. He doesn't know any of it.
It occurs to him that this might not be something solved in an hour, or even a day, and that possibly there are real dangers he ought to be keeping in mind. ]
Also um. Do you happen to know, I don't - have any deathly allergies or - medicine I ought to be taking regularly so I don't... keel over and die or anything? I don't want to like, eat a PB&J and then kick the bucket. That would be a pretty stupid way to go.
no subject
I know. Well... if you don't remember it on your own, I wouldn't mind telling you it again. Who knows? It might even sound better the second time around.
[ She has to think about the allergy thing for a second. Somewhere, there's a disturbance in the Force, as if Jake English's dream self cried out, "Gadzooks, that would be a shitty way to knock off," and was suddenly silenced. By a mouthful of deadly peanuts. ]
That is... a really good question, actually. I don't think you do? At least, not that you've told me about. [ Would the medbay have a record of that? Or if not, Cho might, since she's super conscientious about that sort of thing. ] Have you eaten anything already? 'Cause then we'd know that didn't upset your stom...ach.
[ She trails off as something very important occurs to her. He didn't know he's a superhero. He's forgotten everything about himself. Including...
She brushes a stray hair back from her face, trying to act casual. ] How, uh. How is your stomach, by the way? How's it feeling?
no subject
[ That is a totally healthy and normal way to react to amnesia, right? Being envious of the version of himself who does have a clue what's going on and who has all this access to information about his friends and loved ones that he probably just totally took for granted, the idiot.
Ben isn't entirely convinced by Ami's lukewarm response. He doesn't remember who Cho is, yet, but he does have the idea that he should keep asking around, just in case. Still, he nods when Ami asks if he'd eaten anything already... and then turns to look at her as she asks how his stomach is doing, but in, like, a weirdly specific way. ]
It's fine.
[ He nearly keeps his response to that - simple, straightforward, not exactly a lie.
But something about the way she asks, like she is expecting more of an answer than that, compels Ben to speak up. To mention something that has been on his mind, bubbling anxiously in the background, but that he never would have brought up on his own without being prompted. ]
Ami, is there maybe something... kinda not normal about me? 'Cause earlier, when I was really hungry, I wasn't just hungry, like. It felt like there was something else there. In the back of my mind. Separate from... my thoughts and how I was feeling, and it... or, I don't know, they, seemed really worried and upset. I don't know how I know but - it seemed like that feeling was coming from somewhere else, even though I could feel it, too. And once I ate, it went away. But that... something is still, like, there. And I can feel it being upset, that I'm upset because I can't remember who I am. So I'm wondering if maybe I'm like. Um. Kinda... mentally ill, or something. Like, schizophrenic, or whatever.
1/2
She can't deny she's been morbidly curious about the whole thing. Having a portal to another dimension inside of you, how does that feel? Does it tingle? Can he, like... feel them moving around and stuff? She's wondered about it from time to time, but there's absolutely no good way to ask that kind of question. It's unpleasant for him, and it's none of her gosh dang business anyway.
But then he changes his mind and asks a question that she has zero idea how to answer.
On the one hand, it's fascinating shit. How would you know? she wants to ask. How do you know they're something else's feelings, and not your own? But on the other hand, she feels kind of guilty that this is how she's finding out some of these details, when he's scared and confused and vulnerable.
But then there is also a third hand that she hadn't even counted upon, and that is him trying to chalk it up to mental illness rather than trusting the evidence of his senses. Which is such a Ben Hargreeves thing to do. So what should she do? Tell him about the tentacles? No way - she's well aware he hates them, and that's when they've been there his whole life. But what's the alternative, telling him he's psychotic? Is that better, to him, or worse? ]
2/2
... Huh? Oh, uh, no! That's normal, actually! Everybody gets that feeling sometimes.
no subject
Whew, really?! Holy shit. Okay. God, I was so worried. I- guess I just. Had it in my head somehow that wasn't normal.
[ But he doesn't really know enough yet about what WOULD be normal to contradict Ami, and she just seems so sincere about it. Why would she lie, anyway? She is his friend! She said so, and he feels at ease around her. Hell, even those wordless impulses and thoughts at the back of his mind, the ones she assures him are completely normal, seem to trust and like her.
So Ben beams, grateful, and on an impulse, pulls Ami into a quick, tight hug. ]
Thank you, seriously, that's such a relief. I guess I was just overthinking again, huh?
[ When Ben pulls away, he sets a hand against his stomach, reassured now.
And in a way, his calmness and the lack of any discernible trouble he is having in keeping his powers in check is somewhat making a liar of him, too. Anything he had said to Ami about how he had to keep his powers in check, about controlling them, seems undercut by the fact that right now, totally unaware of their presence, he is having no trouble. He is just... living. No threat to anyone. No pain, no struggle.
It's almost as if all those things he'd been taught about himself, that he is an evil thing by nature, that he is dark and disgusting and has to be controlled, contained, and monitored... it's almost like all of that is total BS! ]
1/2
... Haha, yeah, a little! When it comes to overthinking, you are simply the best there is.
[ She doesn't like lying to her friends. Will Ben be mad when he finds out? Maybe so, but... They pull apart, and she glances briefly at the hand casually resting on his stomach before returning to his face, grinning, as happy as she's ever seen him before. And she decides that, for now, she's done the right thing. He really does seem fine - he's not in pain, he's not struggling to contain anything, nothing's trying to burst out of his abdomen Alien-style. And why should they? From the sound of it, the Tangle Buddies were only upset because Ben was. On their own behalf, they're not mad at all.
So what's the harm in a little white lie, if it makes him happy for a while? Forgetting something painful... she's done that before. There are worse fates. ]
2/2
Uhh, Ben??
[ There's panic in her voice. The worst part is that she can feel it, too, this alien warmth as it snakes up her neck, over her face, into the crevices of her brain - she looks to him for help, but -
... who ... is he?
She should know, right? Wasn't she just talking to him?
She grasps feebly at the mental threads, but they slip through her fingers, ephemeral as silk. The glow fades away, forgotten. It has not left empty-handed.
A young lady stands in the hallway, dazed, blinking into the middle distance. Though it was fifteen years ago she was given life, it is only today she will be given a name! What will the name of this young lady be? ]
no subject
Then Ben sees the glow, too. And he remembers (remembers!) seeing a similar pattern and movement of light under his own skin. That can't be a coincidence, right? Especially not when, a moment later, Ami's look of panic is shifting to one of confusion and... lack of recognition. ]
Ami? Ami, are you alright, what's happening? Are you okay? Say something...
no subject
She blinks a few times, gently shaking the fog from her brain. It takes her a moment to register Ben's presence, another to realize who he's talking to. She points to herself, perplexed. ]
Me? [ She glances side to side, but nope, she's the only one here. ] Uh, okay. Hello there! Where did you come from?
no subject
What? I didn't come from anywhere. I - we were walking to the medbay together, remember?
[ Ben's expression is puzzled and worried as he stares at her and asks: ]
Ami, are you... feeling okay? You - were glowing, just now. Is that normal?
no subject
Huh? No, glowing is Kanaya's thing. [ Her brow crinkles as another detail pops in unexpectedly, like she's only just now remembering it. ] Yeah, no. That's only normal for rainbow drinkers. Are you sure it was me? My name isn't Ami.
no subject
And it sucks too because it leaves him staring at Ami, a furrow between his brows, wondering what is going on, and if he is being played. Ben had thought she was honest, she seemed nice, she seemed like she wanted to help him. But it just isn't adding up. Either she is playing a prank that is not very funny, or someone is manipulating both of them for reasons unknown. Neither is a good option. ]
But you said it was. You told me, just a few minutes ago. And you said my name was Ben, and that we were friends.
[ What is a rainbow drinker? Is that slang for something he should be remembering? But most of Ben's memory seems intact - he remembers what rainbows are and that there are slang names for things and even what some of those names are and this one isn't clicking.
Frustrated, Ben runs a hand through his hair and says: ]
What the hell is going on, anyway?! Is this... supposed to be funny? If it is... then stop. Because it's not funny.
no subject
But as oblivious as she can be sometimes, now that he's telling her this is upsetting him, she can't help but notice this is upsetting him. Which she does feel bad about, even if he's a stranger. ]
I wasn't... I'm not joking around. Sorry. I don't know what's going on either, honest. [ She holds her hands out palms down, in the universal gesture for "calm your tits good sir." ] I literally just woke up thirty seconds ago. So I don't know where I am or how I got here, or...
[ Catching a glimpse of her hands, though, she suddenly takes great interest in them, turning them over and over, as if she's never seen them before. And this, it would seem, is the detail that finally throws her for a loop. ]
... or why I'm pink. Why am I pink?