all this energy calling me

[agogemod]

WHO? Everybody!
WHAT? Welcome home, nerds.
WHEN? Outside time and space, in the aether between dimensions.
ANYTHING ELSE? Violence, as always. Please warn in subject lines for anything beyond physical violence, and move to a personal journal if things go beyond PG-13.

TOUCH BASE;

backfill armed services echelon
COST re-appropriated vehicle 854A-5.2

read the base setting infopage

DEPARTING FRANCE

The order comes out the second day after the Tuileries is sacked:

PACK UP, GET READY TO MOVE OUT. WE'VE DONE ALL WE CAN HERE.

DEPLOYMENT: BASE. WE NEED TO RESTOCK. BE PREPARED FOR MORE TRANSFERS ON ARRIVAL.

STAY SAFE. TIME-STEP EXPECTED TO BEGIN WITHIN THE HOUR. FOR THOSE OF YOU NEW TO COST: FIND A SECLUDED SPOT, AND TRY NOT TO EAT ANYTHING BEFORE THE JUMP.

The Time-Step

The transfer begins, and it starts like a vibrating heat on the collar bone, not painful, not to start with. Just a hum of sensation. But the vibration spreads. Veteran COST soldiers often refer to this phenomena as 'the buzz'. The sensation builds, feeling not unlike standing near a great engine, or the wind rattling the branches of a great tree. There is long a moment of motion sickness, and one cannot always be sure if it is you that is shaking from the inside out, or the world that is shaking you from the outside in. It may just be better to close your eyes against the growing nausea as the world blurs out of focus. A star shines in the distance. You may hear the faint rustling of leaves. Some swear they hear voices in this moment, indistinct words echoing off nothingness. Some swear they feel a touch of the divine; the eyes of the eternal look down upon you. Ancient bones rattle just out of earshot, cold and brittle. Or maybe it's an illusion brought on by powerful technology grafted into your skin.

One thing is for sure: One moment you are here, and the next, you are not.

Nausea is commonly accompanied by this shift. One moment, you're in the cold of France. The next, you're in a temperature regulated hallway, looking not unlike a very poorly put together space station. Droids rush up and down the long hallway, fixing broken bits of machinery or just chattering with each other. Crows sit on high ledges, looking down, watching.

(For those of you who just apped in and didn't participate in the TDM, you'll appear alongside your comrades now, standing in this long hallway filled with droids and crows and men and women in clothing from 18th century France. Of course, you'll be wearing the minimal COST athletic issued underwear, and holding whatever one item you were allowed to bring. Surprise!)

At the end of the hall is a long table with heaps of used clothing on it. The sizes and styles vary, along with color and detail (AKA none look exactly like the linked pics, they're just a baseline, use your ~imagination~). One thing's for certain, all the clothing has been used before, with holes darned and worn edges. They're all clean, though, and each bears a single patch with the words 'KNOW YOUR RIGHTS, THE FUTURE IS UNWRITTEN' and 'COST sewn into the side.

They're not exactly high fashion, but they might be more comfortable than the late 18th century digs you're still wearing, if you showed up in France. Or, you know, the underwear.

Meet the Drill Sergeant

There is the echoing sound of hooves, and a strange creature emerges from a nearby room: a centaur. He smiles kindly, happy to see you've arrived. He has a significant limp in his back left leg, causing his hoof-beats to pitch an irregular rhythm as he walks slowly through the hall.

"Hello, all!" His voice is kind, but it's pitched to carry. "You may know me as Sergeant-- I am in technicality a drill sergeant. You may call me Chiron, if you wish, though I'm to understand some may know others with the same name." He laughs, amused. "In any case, welcome home. It is not much, but we have tried to make it hospitable for you in your time here. Your room assignments have been uploaded onto your BCEs, along with some technological upgrades we've been testing out. There are a few prototypes and experiments you may find in your rooms as well. Our agents are..." He looks up at the crows. "We are a curious people."

He looks over to the table stacked with clothing. "Please pick out what suits you, and make adjustments as needed. If you have any complaints, and wish to change your rooming situation, your username, anything of that nature, please send me a request. I am also known in some capacity as a trainer-"

One of the crows caws, and it sounds almost sarcastic.

Sergeant Chiron ignores it. "Hm. If you wish for me to make a training regiment for you, to better your skill in this organization, please let me know. But for now: I am to understand your last mission was... tumultuous. Please, rest and acclimate yourself to BASE."

He turns to leave, before stopping-- "And please be kind to the crows. They remember slights."

The crows' cawing sounds like laughter.

HOTSPOTS

There's been some technical difficulty since the prognosticators had their little meltdown. Coolant is in short supply, and some of the corridors of BASE are a little warmer than others. Pleasantly warm. Comfortably so, like walking through a sunbeam. In these hotspots, it feels comfortable and snug.

Characters walking through them will feel the urge to lie down and rest, maybe take a quick little nap.

Sleeping in these spots will cause unsettling or confusing dreams, but not nightmares. Dreams in these hotspots-- and sleeping in these hotspots will never be dreamless-- will be hard to remember upon waking, but they seemed very... strange. Almost as though you were intruding on something important but private.

Yet you can't quite remember it when you wake.

If you're clever and watchful, you'll notice the crows avoid these areas, so you can avoid them as well before you're seized by the urge to lie down and nap.

Particularly watchful characters may notice the hotspots are growing in size and number as the days wear on.

(More information about these and the forthcoming December plot will be coming in an infopost on the 12th, but if you have any questions now, feel free to ask here!)

read the base setting infopage

NAV. NETWORK LOGS OOC PLURK DISCORD

Comments

[lonelywar]

[Animals tended to behave in predictable ways. It was something almost comforting about them, a trait that men did not seem to share in the slightest. Perhaps it was that, how very different and abnormal the birds seemed from others Ashitaka had experience with, which was so frustrating. That and, yes, they seemed to do it all for the kicks of getting a rise out of someone. Ashitaka might be an impassive young man, but he kept certain feelings a little less guarded than he might think.

He doesn't respond at first, thinking merely that the crows probably did not see it that way. But he watches with dull fascination as Arthur successfully convinces the crows to move on. Ashitaka was far too direct to think of such coercive methods.] Well done. [Perhaps they would have to think of something to offer them after, so they didn't grow more raucous.

He frowns a bit at the comment.] They are birds trapped within a ship. [Though they might not be the same types of birds he knows, as they can, you know, talk and all, it wasn't a natural environment for them.] Perhaps it is how they choose to pass their time.

[He brings the bow back up, drawing the string and holding it taut for a moment near his cheek. He aims, steadies a moment, and then looses with a quiet exhale of breath. The arrow strikes the target wide right of the center ring.

Still needs work.]

[pointedlook]

[ Arthur's never been one to go out of his way for nature or animals. Too much time spent in cities, around people, dealing with the ins and outs of socializing. Or rather, with working in dreamshare. Which involved a lot of talking to people he barely knew, coordinating jobs and ensuring the team got paid in the end.

Seems like signing up with COST brought a whole slew of new things to consider. Aside from the weird time differences– some people unfamiliar with modern technology– there's these crows. And the information he'd gotten from Grothia, about how she'd been created. It's enough to make anyone's head spin.

Especially since the crows don't really act like normal birds. ]

Somehow, I get the feeling they'd be like this even without being on a ship.

[ Arthur continues to the side a little, wanting to practice on a different target. There's someone else in here, so he quietly screws on the silencer on his pistol. It's only polite.

Of course, he does take a moment to watch as the young man pulls the bowstring back and then lets it fly. ]

How long have you been using a bow? [ The question comes from a place of actual curiosity, rather than being any comment on the arrow hitting wide of the middle point. ]

[lonelywar]

Oh?

[He was without Arthur's knowledge of whatever the collective swarms of birds were. He hadn't even known they could talk before their interference just a moment ago. Being on a strange vessel sailing through the connective tissue between all lands and times, he'd decided to think that talking birds were perhaps the lesser of oddities, but... it wouldn't be any more surprising if they were something entirely different.]

Yes... They do seem to have made this place into their home quite thoroughly. [There didn't seem to be any place of the ship outside their reach, any aspect of it not in some way influenced by their presence.

Even if Arthur's tone had been more cutting, making it seem like a criticism, Ashitaka's response would still have been the same. To merely nock another arrow, lining up the shot and loosing it. It hits a bit closer to center, though too high.]

As long as I have been able to hold one. [It might not show through his shots now, but he had gone several months without firing one. He hadn't gone so long without routine practice or use since he had first been instructed.] When I was taught, it was the most effective and powerful way to defend one's home.

[He pauses, perhaps wistful, though what he seemed to remember wasn't exactly pleasant.]

I found out rather quickly after leaving that that was no longer the case, and that more powerful weapons had started to become commonplace.

[He shoots a look over his shoulder, clearly directed to the handgun Arthur carried. They had been distant ancestors, yes, but weapons of the same family.]