january 2020. welcome to the void.

[modblob]

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.

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.

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.

Navigation.

Comments

[benhargreeves]

[ The reassuring words don't really seem to sink in, and it's only when Charles touches his shoulder that Ben blinks and comes out of that paralyzed, numb panic, looking over at him with fear that makes him look younger, somehow. He looks at Charles and is listening, now, as he bets they can find someone intelligent enough to fix this, that there is hope for the situation to improve.

Mutely, Ben nods, though his throat feels too tight to say thank you right away.

He doesn't know why it is so hard to trust that - that he's going to be alright. Maybe anyone with amnesia would feel this uneasy, or maybe... he has had some kind of life that has made him find it difficult to trust. Ben has no way of knowing for sure.

As they start walking again towards the kitchens, he finally manages to say: ]

I - didn't recognize myself. My reflection.

[ Ben feels like it's important to explain, to make it clear he hadn't just stopped for no reason. Maybe he's just desperate to make sure SOMETHING makes sense, out of all of this.

The silence as the two of them make their way proves itself to be an enemy, and Ben's mind won't settle no matter how much he tries. It keeps tossing anxious thought after anxious thought at him, until he is desperate for some distraction - any distraction. Nervously, he asks: ]

You said. We don't know each other, right? So - so maybe you won't mind um. Telling me a bit about yourself? Since... you won't be repeating it, or anything?

[borntohurt]

About myself?

[ It's a curious request, but. Supposing he just wants to fill the silence, it makes a certain amount of sense. He's not sure how much he'll retain, or if it will matter, but it's hard to want to think of a reason to refuse him.

The guy looks at such a loss, with everything. Not even being able to recognize yourself in the mirror had to shake a person. How do you even cope with that sort of loss of self?

So...yeah. He can talk about himself. Probably. ]

Um, well...I'm from Earth. America. It was 1899, when I left. Got thrown into a city from the future for a while and then ended up here. No real idea how any of it happened, but...I suppose it's better than being on the run.

[benhargreeves]

[ Ben doesn't blame Charles for his initial hesitation. This man doesn't know him, doesn't owe him anything. He's already going out of his way, treating him with far more patience and kindness than, quite frankly, Ben feels he deserves. But he simply can't think of any other way to occupy his mind. He doesn't even know what he likes or dislikes, any of his hobbies or interests, the sorts of things that would usually be useful to keep his mind from unraveling itself from the inside out.

It is a relief when, despite the fact that he's asking so much, Charles does start to talk. Ben listens eagerly, latching onto each concept that makes sense to him as an anchor point, showing he hasn't forgotten everything. He knows Earth. Earth sounds right. He knows America. 1899 seems wrong, though. Not anything he can put his finger on, just... not the right year. ]

So you were taken to the future, and then... this place, whatever it is, without choosing to or knowing how.

[ Then the last bit registers and Ben asks, with surprise: ]

Wait did you say on the run? Like, from the law?

[ What possible crime could this completely gentle, very nice man have ever committed that would be worth making him a fugitive?! ]

[borntohurt]

[ It's a kinder assessment than he might be due. A lot of people would look at a big, broad guy with a bunch of scars and a gun on his hip as maybe not completely gentle, or nice. But the vote of confidence would be appreciated, if he knew what Ben was thinking. ]

Mmhm.

[ Not that it makes much difference here. There's no Pinkertons, likely no one that really knows who he is. Other than Kieran, who would likely have been in just as much danger as him. He could list names and places, but it wouldn't mean much to a man who couldn't even recall his own name.

Better to keep it vague, for the most part. ]

Used to run with some people who did some bad things. Outlaws. But that's not the person I'm trying to be, anymore.

[benhargreeves]

[ Vague as the explanation is, Ben seems satisfied by it. All that fear, so easy to see in his face when he had caught the sight of his unfamiliar reflection, doesn't increase one bit when Charles reveals this information about himself. Sure, this guy is admitting he ran with a bad crowd, which is probably code for being in a gang or being a junkie or who knows what... but he's being honest about it. Ben thinks that, if he were trying to present himself as squeaky-clean and morally upstanding... that would strangely be more threatening.

He doesn't know why that is. But that bias is there, in his mind. Indelible, even without the memory of Reginald's crisp suits and how everyone seemed to look at him and never question he was good, just because he was rich and clean and pretended virtue. ]

I might be an outlaw. Or a really bad person who does really bad things. I've got no clue. Um. Sorry if I am.

[ Ben gives a fleeting, somewhat lopsided smile, before quickly looking away. He really, really hopes he isn't those things. He doesn't want to ruin Charles's progress, and also, he hates thinking that he might be someone who hurts people. ]

What made you want to change? I mean. If it's okay to ask.

[borntohurt]

[ Charles tips his head, observing Ben closely for a moment. It's not always easy to tell just by looking what sort of man someone is. But it's reasonable to assume from Ben's meek, apologetic demeanor that he means no harm as a general rule.

If life changed him somewhere along the way, that shouldn't be counted against him when he can't very well remember any of it. ]

I don't think you are.

[ And his tone is reasonably certain, on that matter. His focus turns ahead, dark eyes fixed on the path he remembers from earlier wanderings, taking the lead at a continued, gentle pace. ]

It was never really the life I wanted. I just felt stuck, like I couldn't do or be anything else. But that was a choice I was making. Had to start making different ones.

...people I knew, friends I had, didn't get that chance. So.

[ So he has to change. Has to make those choices for himself, now. For those who never got the chance to be anything more, or change their ways. For those who listened too long, and realized too late, or never at all. ]

[benhargreeves]

[ It's so strange; he feels sympathetic to Charles, without any context where the emotions are coming from. But he must, at some point in his life, have also felt stuck, like he had no other options available to him. He knows that, because the ache in his chest is too sharp and too stinging to be mere imagination. How he was stuck, by what or whom, he doesn't know. But he remembers that feeling of paralysis.

And he likes that Charles owns up to the fact that he was making choices, too. That he takes responsibility. Ben immediately finds that to be compelling, and admirable. ]

I... think that sounds like a hard choice to make, but a really brave one, and - and a good reason for it, too.

[ He hesitates a moment, not sure if he will be crossing a line, and then adds quietly: ]

I'm sorry about your friends that didn't have the chance.

[ Not hard to guess that the reason they never had that chance was because they'd died - probably violently, given the whole outlaw thing. ]

[borntohurt]

[ Charles nods, a quiet sigh slipping free. ]

Yeah. Me too.

[ There's been enough time now that he's been in these in-between universes, far from home, that the sting of what happened has had time to subside. The ache is still there, the guilt for not being there to save them, for not having the strength to do anything more.

But that sort of wallowing self-pity rarely did anyone any good. It's far easier to focus on someone else, to offer them aid instead. ]

Maybe they wouldn't have chosen to change. I think some of them were fine with the choices they made, and they would have lived and died by them no matter what. But I'm tired of fighting. Tired of all the hurt and the anger. It's not easy to put it all down, but...I've had help.

[ The corner of his mouth curls upwards ever so slightly. ]

Sometimes, someone standing by your side's all you need to find your feet again.