❪ test drive: #2 ❫ THE OVERFLOW

[natha]

ORIGINAL POST

THE PROLOGUE     Many people in stasis seem to be medically sound enough to wake up, brother. Are the preparations ready to go? Yes, I've long prepared myself for this. Watching them everyday has been truly rewarding. ... Right. Yeah. Okay, let's get them ready to wake up. We should keep their minds active to ease the transition into consciousness. A simple VR program should do the trick, I think. I will boot one immediately. There! All systems are green. Their consciousnesses are linked. However, their minds appear to be too active... They may be over-stimulated, brother. Huh? How can that be...? Can we pull them out safely? Not from my end, no. This may be too large for us to fix alone. Do you think...? Yes, I think so... It will have to be done organically. Can you send out a message to our refugees? Of course, brother. I will send one swiftly. We must be sure to fix this before Darma returns. There is urgency in the Orbiters' request. Refugees currently in El Nysa are asked via mass message to please return to Thesa Station virtual reality area immediately. Zasere tells them that the next set of Refugees are scheduled to wake, but there's been an issue. On Thesa, refugees will find that the people in stasis are still apparently trapped in slumber. Most of them are complete strangers, but there's a chance you may recognize a familiar face or two. Normally, these people would wake up from their pods without issue, but due to a malfunction caused by the unforeseen force during The Descent, they have to go through extra measures to make this possible. Those in slumber require extra stimulation, something to keep their minds active. What better than a simulation of an area of El Nysa? Keeping their minds active requires an extremely involved simulation. Those subjected to the VR (prospective characters) will find themselves completely immersed in their new environment, believing themselves to be native Olympians. To wake up from the simulation, characters must work together to accomplish a certain objective(s) in the icy tundra. Characters in-game will be aware that this is a simulation, but this is good practice for properly interacting with El Nysa natives, isn't it? An AC-length log thread on this TDM may be submitted for Two (2) Natha REP points HERE. Please read the OOC note at the bottom of this post for the terms. PROMPT: WINTER CAME     The wind in the icy wasteland is bitter and frigid. You are wrapped up in a winter coat, but even still, the cold bites at your skin and leaves you yearning for a warm fire. Perhaps you're a merchant from the city, here to make a delivery, or you're a royal guard, sent to patrol the area. Who are you? The sky is the limit. One thing is certain — you won't snap out of your new identity until you finish a task. 1. Due to the vast diversity of the creatures on El Nysa and the fact that new ones are constantly being discovered, an important objective is to carefully chronicle different species. Unfortunately, to research these new species, they happen to need more than just a visual. More than just fleeting glances in over a snowy hill. Researchers are constantly looking for ways to secure... You guessed it! Blood and stool samples. The supplies for the former will be given. Supplies are offered in a small box; one per person. In this box is a small dart that will automatically procure a small touch of blood, and easily shaken off so the creature will be able to securely escape. As for the latter— well, they'll give you a plastic bag if that counts. Look, sometimes to get a job done, you have to get your hands dirty. Specifically, they seek samples from a newly recorded rare beast known as a Klep. Kleps spend much of their time hidden in caves, so hitting them with the darts will be tricky. They are also nocturnal, but you may be able to lure them out of the cave with fish as bait. When struck with a dart, you must grab the dart and escape immediately, as they will charge you, and killing such an endangered species is illegal. As for stool samples, well... Once you find a pile, you will have plenty of sample to work with. 2. It's cold, to say the least. Too cold to continue forward. Whatever you were doing, you must stop and seek shelter. Looks like your goal is clear, at least. Get warm. Not finding a way to sustain heat, whether it be seeking shelter, building a fire, cuddling up, or all of the above, will likely end in serious consequences. 3. You are stuck in a dilemma. On one hand, you are set to work for Olympia. One the other, you're not completely sure what is really expected of you, or who the man who gave you this mission truly is. You and your partner are meant to protect precious trade cargo for them. You were told that these were essential supplies for one of the outer colonies. They assured you it was mostly food. In loading the cargo onto the supplied wagon with your partner, however, you noticed something inherently off about it. The weight and even the sounds of some of the contents inside definitely don't sound like food. Moreover, some boxes are more obviously more concealed— draped in black sheets and reinforced on all sides. You've also caught wind of rumors that you are potentially being utilized to supply advanced weapons and other contraband to Wyver terrorists in the colonies. But what do you do? Refuse to make the delivery, and people in the colony will surely starve. Try to remove the weapons and only deliver the food, and you will be killed on sight for being too suspicious. Make the delivery as-is, and not only will Olympians die at the hands of terrorists in the future, but you will betray your country. Decide quickly... 4. There are many dangers associated with traveling in such an isolated, harsh environment. You must help each other to survive. Perhaps someone has fallen on thin ice, and requires a rescue. Maybe someone is on the brink of starvation, and you must share what provisions you have. When you come to, you will awaken in Thesa Station. All will be explained to you by Zasere or Sael via telepathic link. Your world is no more. The Storm has consumed it. We offer proof in the Observation Deck if you desire it, but it won't be an easy thing to stomach. We offer you a new life, in our planet of El Nysa. We just ask for your help in maintaining the vitality of El Nysa. What can we offer you in exchange for your help? PROMPT: STASIS UNIT     You have found the massive section of Thesa known as the Stasis Unit. There’s no special access required to access this part of Thesa Station, but refugees are warned that it may not be for the faint of heart. Here, in large pods that nearly cover every square inch of the space, are all of the people the Orbiters have managed to rescue. Your loved ones, your greatest enemy, your next door neighbor— you might find them here. These people are in a state of deep cryosleep. Due to the damaging effects of The Storm, their bodies are not yet ready to be awoken. PROMPT: GET REKT     The Orbiters have noticed that some of the refugees really miss their video games. The technology in El Nysa could be much worse, but it definitely leaves much to be desired. Which is why, after expressing relief that everyone awoke safely, the Orbiters have decided to provide a little fun in the form of video game competitions. Anything from old-timey arcade machines to state-of-the-art computers, consoles, and VR headsets (though you may be a little tired of VR right now...) is available, and yes, they have your favorite games! Enjoy PAC-MAN, Starcraft 2, or perhaps Dance Dance Revolution! Teach a friend how to play. Get unnecessarily angry and competitive. Most importantly, have fun. Keep fourthwalling to a minimum, please. Recommended playing: QWOP PROMPT: OMAGE     Upon receiving your mobile phone, you will be asked to set a username. Voila, you can now access the network! You can choose to send a message to the entire network, specific usernames, or you can try out the Orbiters’ service, Omage, which connects you to a random user. They thought this might be a good way for their new guests to make friends with each other... Connecting to server... Looking for someone you can chat with... You’re now chatting with [username]... Say hi! PROMPT: WILDCARD     You are welcome to write any scenarios in Thesa Station! Characters have been granted temporary access to the Observation Room, and are encouraged to study it carefully. FINAL OOC NOTE     Please give toplevel priority to prospective characters! Current characters wishing to thread these scenarios with other current characters are encouraged to create separate logs. However, threads between 2 current characters are not eligible for Natha Orbiter REP. These threads may be carried over as game canon if players choose! Players are encouraged to submit TDM threads as application samples, but they are not required. Please direct any OOC questions to the questions thread below! A TDM thread of AC length may be submitted HERE for 2 NATHA ORBITER REPUTATION POINTS. Current players may submit their thread at any time, and prospective players may submit a thread after acceptance. Please note that threads must contain at least five (5) log comments from your character. A toplevel counts as a comment. Network threads are not eligible. QUICK NAV premise ● faq ● world ● map ● reputation ● npcs taken ● reserves ● application calendar ● hiatus/drops ● modbox [ FULL NAVIGATION ] elnysa nysalogs nysaisles nysaooc elnyan

Comments

alvis | killjoys

[fibrosis]

THESA STATION (observation)

[ he's never actually made it outside the quad, honestly. he's definitely never travelled out of the cluster, and technically if you want to take everything into consideration, he's lucky he even made it out of the mines.

and it's not always easy to see the stars from westerley, but it is possible, and it's definitely possible from leith, but that doesn't make this display any less... amazing. it's a whole new set of stars, and while his interest in them is much more passive than it used to be, it's still beautiful to see. no matter how many times he sees a sight like this - such a vast expanse of nothing and everything - he'll never fully acclimate. which is good; he wouldn't ever want to. wonder is a precious thing far too easily broken. while he still has it, it's all that much easier to maintain hope.

hope for what, specifically, right now? he has no idea. but he's not so lost in the new sights and constellations to not be able to notice someone else entering the room. he allows them their time to soak it in, should they need it, before he approaches. ]

Is it new for you too?

OMAGE

un: akari

Not every day I wake up in a new galaxy
At least I made good time on the trip
Not too sure about the brochure's accuracy, but that's probably because I apparently lost mine somewhere
So who's got a decent rundown

GET REKT

[ they have vr programs back home, but most of them are for... well. exactly what you'd expect if anyone said that with a hesitation like that. alvis isn't that fond of the artificial anyway, but he does observe a few other games here and there.

cut to: scene ii, int, sometimeofday. a banana peel was just laid on the inside edge of a turn. cursing can be heard.

he found mario kart. he's not great at it, but he's not bad, and he's thoroughly enjoying learning what the upgrades mean. ] What's the red grenade for?

id: killjoy

[motivation]

[ that username though!! ]

alvis?

[fibrosis]

[ he used it for a reason. also bc usernames - not really where you want to just go by a given. ]

who is this?

[ 'killjoy' is definitely a step in the right direction but. he knows more than one of you. not all are necessarily friends. ]

[motivation]

someone who knows what type of hokk you like best
take a wild guess, tree boy

[ she's not 100% sure yet it's him, but hope is a treacherous thing already taking up roots in her heart. ]

[fibrosis]

[ shit he could almost laugh with relief. he's not even really sure why ]

didn't expect to find you here
not that i was expecting to find anyone

[motivation]

johnny's here as well
you've been lazing in a stasis pod for two months

[fibrosis]

have not
i mean i guess sort of but i still beg to differ on the terminology

d'avin?

[motivation]

still in there. fancy and turin, too.

[fibrosis]

well at least you're not
if anything would be what got them out it would be you
usually

you've been here two months or i've been in some pod for two months?

[motivation]

would you have wanted me to smash it? they said you weren't ready to wake up yet

[fibrosis]

woah
who said anything about smashing?

[motivation]

[ how else would dutch solve a problem but with violence? ]

i did

oh my god finally my internet is back

[fibrosis]

yes, you did
i'm just not sure why the idea came up in the first place

[motivation]

it would have gotten you out of the pod

[fibrosis]

that wasn't quite how i meant that

still didn't answer my question

[motivation]

i didn't know how to without doing something potentially terrible, all right?

[ she's torn halfway between believing the orbiters aren't shitty and wouldn't have lied about alvis, d'avin not being ready yet to get out of the pod, and natural distrust and the possibility that they'd use d'av to punish her for breaking out alvis or vice versa. ]

just shut up and tell me where you are

[fibrosis]

Dutch
the first thing i do when i roll out of my cryo-stasis pod bed and into another galaxy only to find that you got here first to scout it out isn't gonna be to accuse you of not doing it fast enough

[ she seems... stressed.

not that he can blame her - he's having a bit of trouble adjusting too, although this, at least, is something a little more familiar. even though he's apparently caused some misunderstanding already, gently untangling it isn't anything new.

hopefully the conversation in person will start a little smoother. he had been exploring, but he can probably stay put long enough for her to find him. ] some hallway between the sims and the hangar bay
according to the person i just asked
unless it would be easier to meet somewhere

[motivation]

[ she is stressed. she's stressed because that's exactly what she thought and she's stressed because she's not in front of him, seeing him move and knowing that it's really him, that he's really awake. she's stressed because d'avin is still in there and so is pree.

she's stressed because there might be hullen in there, too. ]

if you can find the hangar bay, i'll meet you there

[fibrosis]

see you there

[ which is where he'll be, standing at a walkway near the entrance and watching the ships come and go. she might notice he's wearing the same robes he walked into the vaults with, or the healing on his face, but they've been down there for a few days now and he only has about three markedly different articles of clothing anyway. whenever she comes close enough for him to notice her, he turns and wow, yeah

he'd believed it was her when she said it was, because that matched up with the small amount of information he had so far, but still. different in person. ]

Not quite our usual meeting place.

[motivation]

[ she's missed him. she's missed him and she's worried about him and now he's out and in front of her and it's really him. it is different, seeing it for herself, even if she'd known that it could only be him after their conversation, throughout it.

this is better. she doesn't realise yet that he's from a markedly different time than she is, but for now, details like that don't matter so much. what matters is closing the distance between them and wrapping her arms around him in a show of caring that dutch had been getting better at.

(johnny making her soft, khlyen would say — but khlyen is dead.) ]

Our usual meeting place doesn't exist anymore.

[ is the bleakness of those words softened by the fact that they're pressed into his robes? ]

[fibrosis]

[ stay you, he'd said to her, and raising his arms to return the gesture, he's glad that apparently she did. at least in some of the many ways that matter, in most of the ways he's always seen her in danger of losing. while the circumstances aren't great, he is pleased to see her - really never couldn't be - and if she had to be here at all he's glad she's apparently had Johnny as well. ]

I heard. [ believes? he's still working on that, although if she does, well. he's a man of faith, and his faith in her has always felt as natural to him as any other.

(it only strengthens his current, selfish, disinclination to avoid the hells out of the stasis pods, because he doesn't want to see the ultimate truth of his actions, how much or how little his rebellion or his faith mattered, or if Johnny was right about what it was he was truly giving people.) ]

Glad you made to the new one.

[motivation]

[ she's tried, and more than once she'd almost lost whatever it is he thinks is more her than other things. sometimes, dutch isn't sure. alvis thinks she's better than she herself does; she's a weapon forged for killing and she'd run away from that truth all those years ago.

it is still true, but she's more than that, too. he helped show her as much, though no one did as much as johnny. ]

Glad to see you finally decided to join us in the brave new world.

[ having him in front of her, solid beneath her arms before she steps back from the hug, that makes the teasing easier. there's no anger or reproach in her tone now, nothing like what she'd read into the text messages. (her own bad conscience talking, maybe.)

it's not much of a brave new world, but some of it seems less shit than westerley. still: dutch misses old town, shithole or not. it had become home as much as lucy did. ]

[fibrosis]

[ if he didn't look at things and see their potential, he never would have made it out of the mines. hells, he might not have survived the tunnels long enough to make it into them. he wouldn't be trying to save a moon choking on everything that keeps it in orbit, that should keep it stable, and he definitely wouldn't have been able to find temples made of artificial trees and follow their roots to the surface and beyond. ]

Figured it'd be easier to build one if I knew what they looked like. [ he says, releasing her when she begins to pull back and settling into a comfortable stance, hands clasped loosely in front of him. she's a creature of nuance - he's not bothered at all that the black and white of text sometimes doesn't play out well. ]

[motivation]

[ he's always been brighter than her and steadier, seeing hope and possibility where dutch sees a battlefield. it's something she likes about him, something she's come to rely on over the years. she trusts alvis, and he's a piece of steady ground even after the end of the world. ]

There must be easier ways than this.

[ her tone is lighter now, but there's real regret underneath it. alvis won't ever get to see the westerley he'd fought so hard for. dutch might not ever know her full history. she won't get to fight her war. none of them get what they wanted. ]

[fibrosis]

[ alvis has always liked being relied on. it's a side effect of other things he likes more - instigating change, helping people - but it's a nice one. makes him feel like he's not going to float away into his own ambition.

there's a slight shift in the set of his features to indicate something along the lines of amusement, but you couldn't really give name to the expression. ]

I'm not sure it's supposed to be.

[ but speaking of brave new worlds, his eye catches something moving in the hangar, and he tracks it for a couple of moments. there's still a lot to take in, and perhaps a new topic to move on to, so he shifts gears a little bit. ]

So, are you gonna show me around or do you think it's better to discover it yourself?