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Entry tags:
- * dreamy,
- * npc: agent young,
- * npc: commander grothia,
- * npc: sergeant chiron,
- * setting: base,
- achilles [fate],
- akira kurusu [persona],
- arthur [inception],
- ashitaka [princess mononoke],
- daenerys targaryen [asoiaf],
- hei [darker than black],
- henry cooldown [no more heroes],
- keyleth [dungeons & dragons],
- kylar stern [the night angel trilogy],
- mordred [fate],
- noctis lucis caelum [final fantasy],
- ryuji sakamoto [persona],
- siegfried [fate],
- soldier 76 [overwatch],
- travis touchdown [no more heroes],
- yoshitsugu otani [samurai warriors]
all this energy calling me
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.
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
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
no subject
[And if he were back home, it was something he would still do. He was selective, of course; he had decided that simply returning violence to either of the sides instigating the conflict would not put out the fire of war, instead making it more unstable and volatile. There were different enemies between there and here, though, and they were meant to be reassured that their fighting in the war was justified because these wars had already occurred (by others' standpoints, not his). They were meant to happen, and to divert them entirely would cause more destruction than the lives possibly saved.
That sort of long game didn't appeal much to Ashitaka; he saw what was before him, perceived minor avenues he could pursue to try to alleviate suffering and anger where he saw it. Trying to expand his mindset to what COST wanted of him was, in a word, difficult. And tiring. And demoralizing.
He hadn't fired an arrow in several months; he isn't sure he had ever had such a long lapse in practice before coming here. Of course he would be rusty. He would simply have to keep practicing until he had recovered the skill he had lost.]
No. [He goes through the motions of firing another arrow. This one actually hits the bullseye - not dead center, but it will do. He seems a little more pleased with that.] Only that which I was told when I first awoke. There was a malfunction, and that the memories might not be recoverable. [He is quiet for a moment.]
Sometimes I wonder if there is anything else I do not remember.
[But, no, they had all been brought on to this COST crew relatively recently, right? It was probably an errant worry.]
no subject
I guess if there is, you wouldn't know. It's hard to know what you don't know.
[ There's a dry humor in her tone, but it's quick to soften. She's only joking there, since her first response is so often that kind of humor first and a serious answer second. ]
That just means you have to trust them to some extent. [ She shrugs casually, but not dismissively ] What do you think about them? Our— Leaders, I guess.
no subject
[In all seriousness, he doesn't think it's much of anything; they had made an argument convincing enough to get him to come along, and he had been transferred to Jerusalem. If there had been any other missions in-between, the results would have been the same: him doing as he did now, the best that he could to help.
Though he yearns for home often enough, but he must think that there are many others that feel similarly.
He can sense that Aloy is trying to lighten the rather dreary subject, though, and he appreciates it. He's just kind of a dreary person at baseline, though, sadly...
He lowers his bow, thinking.]
My first impressions were not strong. [He turns to look to Aloy.] I first met the commander after Xici's execution, and the sergeant when he reprimanded us for our lack of action in Paris. In both circumstances they were frustrating, seeming cruel or overly critical.
But... I have spoken again with both since those times. I feel I still do not know them well enough to know for sure, but they have compassion enough to speak to their recruits, to understand their concerns. It is more than some might.
Time will tell the truth, I suppose.
[A beat.] And yourself? What do you think of them?
no subject
I don't have much of an opinion. It's kind of why I was curious what yours was.
[ Though she realizes that's not much of an answer. She makes a noise of thoughtfulness, a low hum ] I don't think they're incompetent. [ high praise ] I wouldn't be as interested in helping if I thought they had no idea what they were doing. I figured that's why I went to Rheiah instead of staying in Paris with the rest of you. There wasn't much I could do there.
[ It was too much politics for her, or at least that was her impression from hearing about how it had gone afterwards. Rheiah was more suited to her skill-set, so she had felt more at home there than Paris or Jerusalem. She hopes that they'll go somewhere like it soon, though unfortunately, she's out of luck there. ]
As long as they actually listen to people and don't think of them as just numbers for some bigger fight, it works for me. I'm not really— [ She seems to change her mind on the phrasing partway through, and instead says: ] Well, fighting and working like this is kind of new to me. So I don't have much to compare them to.
no subject
He knew that it was different here, and that it would be required of him to tow the line in various ways. He might have had a different opinion of it if he had any control of where or when he could go, but as it was there wasn't much they could do.
He listens carefully to her as she speaks, going carefully through the motions of firing a few more arrows at the distant target. His aim certainly seems to improve.
Rheiah? That is why he hadn't seen much of her in Paris, then.]
I have met people who consider people in such a way. Or... [Perhaps that was too harsh. Eboshi did what she did because of those sheltered in Irontown, and surely the gods had their affections for their subjects. But...] Their fixation on their goals allowed them to slip into such a mindset. After speaking to the commander and the sergeant, I do not get that impression from them.
[He inwardly reflects on his conversations with both of them.]
This fight... is very personal, for both of them. That they fight alongside us maintains us as individuals to them, and I think it would prevent them from using us so callously as pawns.
[He lowers his bow.]
Or, at least, this is what I hope.
[In his first meeting with the commander, he had criticized her decision-making, and though he had cooled off and thought it could be considered a mistake, she hadn't gotten angry at him. She had taken him aside and spoken more about their situation and her place in it. Something similar happened with him and the sergeant, though over the network.
He has to believe that those who would show such specific individual interest wouldn't use them as kindling for the fire they were hoping to set.]