agogelogs | all this energy calling me

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.

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

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

(a hard blink and he makes an abrupt turn towards the voice.

thankfully, hei's changed his tune a little: sour-faced and trying to breathe carefully through this in the calmest way possible.)

No— it's outside, out there. If you'd take a look—

[Okay, this dude is definitely not alright. Is there something bad in the windows? Some kind of trap, like the warm spots? He squints out the window to see... some really trippy shit, honestly, but that's just day-to-day when you're a Garden creation that worked with Spyral.]

[He looks back to his companion.]

You wanna, uh, describe what you saw?

[He's trying to be, like, patient and caring and shit.]

(trippy shit is a daily thing, but space or what it's made of is truly jarring. it's like he's spent every second of his twenty-five years wondering at it, only to die and wake up in it...

did he die after all was said and done? could this be his afterlife?)

...

If you're psychoanalyzing me, quit while you're ahead. (sharp is the tone he answers with, but it's followed by a heavy silence and the fearful urge to find someone else who understands this feeling.) It wasn't what I saw, it's what I felt.

[Midnighter snorts, genuinely amused. This guy's a funny one.]

If you don't wanna be psychoanalyzed, don't talk about your feelings.

[He turns to look out the window again, at the swirling coronas of spacetime and moons changing phases simultaneously.]

So what did you... feel?

(midnighter doesn't understand, of that he's certain. these feelings far divorced from sentimental ones; this is different, something he's meaning to convey but lacks appropriate terms. god, he's always been so poor at this.

warily, he gives the man a once over. he should be concerned about things other than what's outside. right now what's outside can't harm him, but midnighter -- who looks the brutish type -- can.)

Like something is watching us. (parroting himself, taking a bitch ass tone.) It wasn't coming from you staring at me, it was from outside.

You don't have to believe this.

Kind of my job to look into threats, [he says, as though this weirdo is the one he's pretending. And, hell, maybe he is. If someone says they're scared or bothered or suspicious, it doesn't matter where or when he is. He's gotta follow up on that.]

You don't have anything to gain from lying to me.

[He keeps staring into the strangeness out the window, really focusing on it.]

(his job? well, there are only a handful of things that could mean. one is that he's a civil servant, in some public safety job. another is that he's government -- but, ultimately, he's lacking too many details to discern that from a few looks at him and a throwaway comment.

he reminds himself there'll always be time later.)

No, I don't. (to seek the most rational route: that's his job as a contractor.

it's almost relieving to see midnighter step up to the plate and watch the scenery he's watched, something that pulls a bit of tension out of his shoulders. if he sees something or feels something... that'll only give him a shred of confidence, one he can go forward with. it may actually get him away from the window, instead of letting him steep in the skepticism.)

...

Anything?

(hates the way it sounds, like he's searching for validation. but it could be dangerous and midnighter agrees -- that's enough, right?)

Not really, but I'm immune to a lot of stuff.

[But he keeps staring. This is clearly serious, at least for this guy. Midnighter's natural inclination, in situations like these, is to provide aid. He'll figure out whatever it is that's watching them, and kick its ass.]

How long were you watching before you, uh, felt it?

Immune?

(this is starting to sound familiar. there's no feasible way midnighter comes from the same timeline or even the same universe, but likening what he hears to something he knows — he sounds like a contractor. wouldn't be that bad of a development, having someone powerful like that on his team.

whatever he is... he's accommodating.) I... don't know how long it's been. Half an hour, maybe.

(hei's starting to feel childish, but there's only one way to prove that his mind isn't breaking down under stress again. someone else has to feel it. surely someone else will.)

Let your mind go. I'll stay quiet. (his tone drops from something already soft, taking a small step back.)

My mind isn't really good at 'going', but... sure.

[He'll try. If someone's in trouble, if there's a threat they need to know about... he'll try.]

[So he just nods, and leans toward the porthole. The computer begins to try and analyze the images in front of him, coming up with a string of pointless numbers as it fails to make sense of the moons and stars setting and shining and exploding all at once in an endless cycle. Going on forever, it seems, like time means nothing at all. Stars shoot by, zip backward, explode into coronas and blossom in to flames. The moon rises and sets simultaneously. It's not his moon. The satellite almost looks like a skull, shining bone rising out of the darkness of space, clean and hollow, with craters like eye sockets-]

[Midnighter hisses and steps away.]

Yeah- something's fucking out there.

(watches midnighter — the only one who's taken the time to indulge him and have patience enough to try — for what feels like aeons, but there a lot of things he has trouble grasping when his overactive imagination rips from its leash and wreaks havoc on the neighbourhood of his brain's lobes.

minutes trickle by and the last few hours begin to catch up with him in a hurry. the landing in france, the king's beheading, the riots, the chases, a bloody billhook, a tavern brawl with his a would-be comrade, the lonely seats he took with several more, the extraction, a warp through aether, the thing outside.

it's warm in the hall but that's not what makes sweat mat long bangs, as hei waits for something he knows will sit poorly with him no matter what the answer is. he's losing grip again and he doesn't know what to do. what can he do? what is there to help him in here? no one and nothing is familiar; he doesn't have a single soul left. everyone's dead. now, in a glorified dinghy in the middle of this ocean of time and space, it's all streaking by like it means so little, nothing and everything happening simultaneously. oh god. god, he feels seasick and has to tear himself away to press a hand against a patchwork metal wall, hearing the reel-back of his comrade and the consequent confirmation of his greatest dreams.

—his greatest dreams?

vividly, a memory, "really? i have a lot of wishes… i want to become a nurse and go to outer space!"

they weren't his dreams. they belonged to someone else and now he's an imposter clawing onto their coattails. this is his greatest fear. this unknown is one he feels himself backing away from with a glove sliding and catching over old panelling and stripped nails. midnighter's standing against a backdrop he wants nothing to do with and it's obvious to him now that he's bitten off far more than he can chew.)

Damn it. (a hoarse whisper after a thick, air-filled swallow that leaves his throat dry.)

Hey, hey.

[He assumes the other man is reacting with fear. His tone, calm and gentle, is genuine. Sure, his voice is gruff, he's been told it's not an especially comforting thing to hear, but he's trying.]

Whatever it is, it can't get through me. It'll be fine.

Edited 2017-12-10 19:59 (UTC)

(fear is high on the list, grappling with it. any voice would be enough to ground him in the present, however, but hearing it, registering it as something stable to focus on, he's glad it's rougher. something babying would make him sicker, but hei blinks awake with a sharp suck of a breath inward.

quickly wipes at his brow, jaw snapping tight in a strong grit of teeth.)

You can't say that. (full of air, hushed and harsh.) You saw it, you know.

I felt it, [now he's just being a dick. Tone it down, tone it down.] Only one thing out there that can beat me, and whatever's out this window, it wasn't him.

(that's—)

What?

(only one person can kill him? thinks back to achilles, his invulnerability, and exhales the breath that's been sitting in his lungs for far too long. it's possible, of course anything is now, but he can't be that reliable. he doesn't trust something like that, especially when it could mean trouble for him.

shakes his head, dragging the hand down his face.)

Forget it. You've confirmed what I needed to know.

[Calm down, dude, he's just talking about his ex.]

Just for the record, I'd suggest not looking out the window any more than necessary. It could be they cause hallucinations, not, you know. Tapping us into another plane of existence, or whatever.

(things he doesn't know: THAT.

the suggestions, however, actually manage to get a quiet sniff out of him.)

Noted.

(and there's that telltale pause, obviously weighing something in his head.)

...

Thanks.

[He can kind of guess that took something like effort on this guy's part. Which, hey. Time ago, it would've been hard for Midnighter to thank somebody, too. He's lucky in a lot of ways, lucky Apollo was willing to teach him how to be a fucking person. A lot of people don't get that.]

No problem. Like I said, it's my job. [He looks the guy over.] You got a name to go with all that smolder?

(trial and error meeting the wrong and right people. hei's been through it, he'd understand if it was presented to him, but their sharing stops at names. and smoulders.)

Hei.

(a bare motion towards him with an open palm, clearly wanting a trade.)

You're... (he starts, refusing to take a stab at a guessing game he already knows — and refuses to voice — the answer to.) What, exactly, do you do?

I kill people.

[He grins that same eerie grin.]

But only for justice.

[He knows how it sounds, ridiculous and over the top, which is exactly why he puts it that way. It's all that he is, all that he's good for, his purpose. He's not like normal people, and pretending otherwise is fucking stupid.]

(kill people. for justice. a darker form of heroics, if that's the way it's phrased.

he's met people who tiptoe that line. everyone who kills believes they have a reason, even when the reason is that they don't. it's refreshing to hear it said aloud, though, announced the way that it is.)

Hm. Justice isn't something I pretend to understand. (killer two looks at killer one and decides there's only really one thing to ask after the reveal:) What's your name?

Edited 2017-12-10 23:42 (UTC)

Maybe I can just see it better without all that hair in my eyes.

[He's grinning, it's obviously (he hopes) a joke. Justice is a fickle, confusing thing; he doesn't pretend to understand all its nuances. He just sticks to the simple shit: When somebody hurts someone, they deserve to pay.]

And it's Midnighter. Or M, if you want.

...

(don't touch your bangs. don't touch your bangs. raises a hand like he's going to touch his bangs and curls his fingers into a fist instead. right, a joke. he gets it, despite the perpetually somber eeyore stare.)

M, then. (the simpler the better; he likes one syllable names.

a shift towards him and away from the wall, in far better straits than he was. he hates to think it, but it's helped out. talking to this guy.)

Is it wise to tell others? What we felt?

[Midnighter stares at the fist, and then at his eyes, and then at the window again, eyes flicking between all three.]

I'm sorry, can you rephrase that so it sounds less like we're in a romance novel?

Edited 2017-12-11 01:54 (UTC)

all this energy calling me

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so melodramatic.................

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