TEST DRIVE MEME 001

[ataraxites]

T E S T   D R I V E   M E M E A R R I V A L You wake up, alone in the dark. There's a breathing tube jammed down your trachea, and you're suspended in a tube of clear blue fluid. Through the fog you can see shadows of movement, the muted sound of alarms crying. Upon registering your level of consciousness, the gravity couch drains the fluid surrounding you and retracts the breathing apparatus; the doors in front of you open, and you're suddenly dropped several feet onto the opposite wall. It takes you several minutes to catch your breath and gather strength in uncooperative limbs; more time still to climb up through the debris to the hole in the outer wall high above. You emerge in bright sunlight, surrounded by an immense jungle. As your vision clears, you realize you stand on the hull of a colossal spaceship, crashed on an alien planet. There's a shout behind you, and as you turn, figures climb over the curve of the ship towards you: your rescue party, weathered and scarred by the efforts necessary for survival. B A S E   C A M P A ramshackle spread of tents and shelters built out of resources salvaged from the ship and gathered from the jungle. Not sleek, not clean, but alive: people coming and going from tent to tent, heading out into the jungle or returning with freshly foraged food. Some are working to build more shelters or improvize working tech out of parts salvaged from the ship; some are cooking; some are just taking shelter from the sun for a while. Whether you find somewhere to help or apply your skills, it's probably a good idea to get to know your neighbors. E X P L O R A T I O N The jungle is dense and green, teeming with life, high calls and cries of strange animals and birds, the low buzz and murmur of insects. There are no paths or notable markings; go too far into the trees and you may not be able to find your way back. Dangers hide in the shadows but there's also food, water - or perhaps you're looking for more, pushing further in a search for answers about this planet you're now living on. Or you can turn your attention to the crashed ship, the huge bulk of it balanced precariously on the edge of a cliff. It creaks and groans in its delicate position, audible from a distant but all the louder should you venture inside. Dark corridors made even more dangerous by the damage to the internal structure, debris and obstacles blocking progress, and any wrong step could cause it to collapse in on you, or send the ship over the cliff. But finding any tech, resources or supplies might just be worth the risk. C H O O S E   Y O U R   O W N . . . Hunt or flee from strange creatures in the jungle, take a try at rock-climbing down the cliff-face, or practise in-game gained abilities. Ataraxion is currently without a network until one is built, but test-driving on a prospective one is also totally fine!

Comments

carolyn fry | the chronicles of riddick: pitch black | reapp from months ago hi

[suddenlycaptain]

ARRIVAL;
[ At first, this is familiar. Not safe, never safe, but familiar. Cyrofluid, breathing tube, alarms, shapes beyond the glass -- it's another jump, or rather just after.

Then the gravity couch opens and Carolyn falls, slowly registers different -- wreckage, the ship on its side.

Not so familiar, that.

Something's gone wrong, they've crashed, had to have. She stands, glances at her nanites; jumbled, nothing clear on them. She can understand the people around her, though; they still work for that. The place where the bioraptor impaled her aches as if it's fresh, and when she reaches up to brush hair out of her face, she realizes: the scars she gained on the Tranquility are gone. ]

Wha-...?

[ How long has she been out? How long...?

It's possible, she realizes as she picks herself up off the ground, that it's not how long she's been out. It's how long she's been gone. There are no new memories of her universe, but there wouldn't be; she's dead there. Still, it wouldn't be the first time this has happened. It makes her feel faintly nauseated (also not unusual, with jumps), but she swallows it down.

If the ship crashed, then she has to move, figure out how stable it is or isn't. She can see the way out. She just has to climb up. Hand over hand, foot over foot, try not to think too hard about the hundreds of possibilities as to what happened, try not to think about the people (Nathan? Tyke? Wash? Riddick?). Focus. Breathe in, breathe out. Survive, then you can help others. ]

If this happened because someone was an idiot... [ she murmurs; a waste of breath, but this planet has more oxygen than the last one she was stranded on. More gravity, too. If there's anyone friendly outside, she'll just have to hope they're on the more intelligent end of the spectrum.

God, she hopes no one made the Tranquility crash because of something avoidable. ]

BASE CAMP;
[ She's seen worse than this ramshackle setup of tents and almost-shelters. She's seen people living in sewers and beneath pieces of fabric, people hoping to stowaway on a ship because even months or longer while everyone else is in cryosleep was preferable to where they were. That they're so close to the crash site makes sense as much as she wants to move away from it, as much as she knows they can't because they all feel the pull when they move too far away.

It has her scowl even as she stomps on a branch, bending it with her weight to try and help loosen the roots, pull it up. Just cutting it off won't stop the growth of brush, and Carolyn doesn't want to wake up in the middle of the night to a bush instead of a pillow.

Not that they really have a lot of pillows.

Dirt smears her face where once it was engine grease when she goes to find the non-acidic water, when she pokes through what's been salvaged and hasn't been claimed. She feels unsteady, off her feet; she knew the shuttle bay like the back of her hand and now it's gone, hasn't been hers in months anyway. Now they're on a strange planet and it's both exactly like and completely different from the world she can't ever go back to.

You may just hear a sigh and Carolyn muttering. ] Shit.

Base Camp

[sicklesforsass]

Come on. Can't be all that bad, can it?

[ Who's surprised that James Potter is offhandedly eavesdropping and offering a remark while someone else is trying to make themselves useful?

James isn't as casually messy as he would normally prefer. Even with his magic, he's finding it hard to completely adjust to suddenly living in the wilderness. He isn't the roughing it sort, and it shows. His hair sticks more on end than usual and he's sporting a bruise on his cheek lately from a run-in with a tree branch that he'd prefer not to talk about anymore, thanks.]

arrival.

[20mentholkools]

[She's within reach of the rend in the Tranquility's hull when a hand appears, reaching down to her. Palm open, bare of those distinctive gauntlets, but still likely recognisable. They'd spent enough time watching each other work with their hands; enough time that Riddick even does this, turning back to offer her a hand up as soon as he'd heard her voice. Maybe some part of him had been listening for it, searching for signs of her from the moment he'd woken, climbed his way out of the wreckage into the sunlight.

The ship destroyed left questions, left him wondering how long he'd been out for, but he'd been here before, crashed on an unknown planet. It could be adapted to. Carolyn Fry's survival, that was something else; a level of importance in his mind that he'll never admit to, but has left him reaching down to her without a second's consideration that she might reject it.]

BASE CAMP ; HI!!!

[romanticism]

[ maybe the worst part of coming back here yet again is the lack of familiar faces. oxford had grown strangely accustomed to the healthy amount of friends he had accumulated here over the time he had spent on the tranquility. their absence now aches, but he realises it is a selfish impulse more than anything. he can't be sad for their being gone, so long as it was under... more acceptable circumstances, hopefully, than what was experienced by others. being reunited with these memories again is very strange. he's been gone long enough, in his own world and from here, that they fit a little uncomfortably (but snugly?) in his mind.

to see someone he knows, however, provides him with more comfort than he could have imagined. of course, he knows how this place works, how fickle it can be with what people remember and what they do not, if they remember anything at all.

he joins carolyn, standing by her side, observing the plant she is so actively trying to remove from the ground. he understands her concern for the bush; this seems to be a very healthy sort of jungle, with all its various, thriving dangers and an abundance of plant life. oxford wears a faint smile, crooked to one side, but not at all a smirk. a habitual, characteristic smile. the kind that'd tell anyone quite easily what he thinks of this place, and it is not much, essentially. ]

Agreed. [ and finally, he turns his head to her, brows arching questioningly. ] Would you like a hand?

James Potter | Harry Potter Series | OTA

[sicklesforsass]

Arrival:

[ James isn't sure what he's waking up to. There's goop. And something down his throat... and bleeding hell, what has Sirius done to him now?

He thrashes weakly, which is clearly cue for the prank to take it down a notch. Whatever is in his throat retracts while the goo drains away. It's enough to make a bloke think that the worst is almost over. Right up until the door opens and he has time for a loud curse before he drops in a pile of flailing limbs straight to the floor. Stars prick his vision after the impact. His head swims while his stomach turns.

This is not something his mate has done to him.

Can't be. Sirius would be out and laughing at this point. Or Remus would have come to his rescue with concern knitting his eyebrows together. Peter should already be throwing himself on James's mercy. ]

Hullo?

[ His voice is weak and peters out as he realizes, belatedly, that he has no clothes.

Hell.

Uncooperative limbs are forced into movement and James finally staggers to his feet to the sound of alarms and other noises that are nothing close to familiar. His stomach tightens as unpleasant scenarios from the darker parts of the wizarding world worm their way into his brain, but he puts one foot ahead of the next all the same.

Everything is blurry without his glasses, but he stumbles upon some poor bloke's clothes eventually. He assumes that the unknown man won't fault him for avoiding being absolutely starkers, and takes the jumpsuit for himself. Then, he finally spots daylight.

Way. Waywayway. Way up above him.

...It's much later when James Potter pulls himself shakily onto the hull. He hears a startled sound and turns to blink owlishly toward the voice. Merlin, what he wouldn't give for someone to accio his wand and glasses from wherever they've fallen right about now. ]

Base Camp:

[ Ramshackle though it may be, there's certainly a novelty and charm to the collection of tents. His earlier fears are more or less soothed, leaving James with just his curiosity and time to burn.

From the sound of it, he's not getting back home for a minute. ]

All right? [ he asks of the first person he encounters, shoving his rescued glasses up his nose. ] You look a touch busy, and normally I'd respect that--

[ He wouldn't. ]

--only I just woke up in [ a vague wave in the general direction of the crashed ship ] that over there and I'm a bit lost. Where exactly am I meant to be going now?

!!! base camp!

[fullmoon]

[ James can be forgiven for addressing Remus as a stranger, for several reasons. First, he's two years older now than James ever will be, and (probably) several more years older than he was when James last saw him. Second, his hair is getting too long and currently is very wet, hanging drippy over his face, which in turn (third) is turned downturned and mostly hidden under a person-sized piece of scrap metal he's crouched down beside and lifted up to look beneath in search of nonmetal things. Wands, for example.

Fourth, they're, you know, on an alien planet, middle of nowhere, very disorienting.

But Remus couldn't be forgiven for not knowing his voice—two years is nothing, really—and so he goes very still, when the unseen someone starts talking to him, and he needs until the end of the question to steel himself against the possibility that it isn't James and lower the metal enough to look.

He looks. He's been around long enough and thought about this possibility long enough that he doesn't quite look like he's seeing a ghost. He does, however, forget to smile. ]

[ He says, ] Oh. [ It's very profound. Equally profound: he drops the metal on his toes. They're saved from crunching by his boots and the give of the mud beneath his feet, but it does startle him, if it doesn't actually hurt. So the second thing he says is, ] Ouch.

[ He'll make it out of monosyllables eventually. ]

elena gilbert ( the vampire diaries )

[whinings]

[ ARRIVAL ]

[ arriving in a state of panic makes the whole situation that much more stressful. elena is no stranger to kidnappings, you see, it's actually feeling somewhat normal to wake up in a strange place with no memory of how she got here - but this time it feels less like a kidnapping and more of a science experiment. she chokes out the breathing tube, starts slamming her hands on the inside of the pods door as the fluid drains, and she's all ready to start shouting for help when the doors open, and she falls.

all things considered it could be far worse. she's naked as the day she was born, sure, but in amongst the debris there's the remnants of ratty towels scattered around and a couple of those do the job - and later she stumbles on a stock standard jumpsuit with only a few tears and quickly trades it in. the drop isn't so significant that it does a lot of damage either, but as she stands up elena quickly realises that she's landed badly on a wrist, and that doesn't exactly bode well for the current situation. she hauls herself up though, her legs shake like she's been bedridden for weeks and while she wants to freak out about that too, she can't. it's really not the time to be panicking about the how-where-why, because something has clearly gone wrong if the flashing red lights are anything to indicate, and all she can think about is getting out.

it's hard though. her wrist isn't exactly life threatening but it is sprained, and shifting debris to make a clear path is slow and tiring. she's barely made a dent when she drops to a sitting position, already out of breath, and swears under her breath that she'll start lifting weights again as soon as she makes it home. the thought is interrupted by the sound of someone else moving around, and for a moment elena is so relieved that she doesn't even consider that it might not be a smart move, just jumps up and calls as loud as she can through cupped hands. ]

Hey! Is there someone up there? I'm- [ lost? kidnapped? panicking? hurt? ] stuck!

[ nailed it ]

[ BASE CAMP ]

[ unfortunately, elena has very little in the way of marketable skills. hell she doesn't even cook, and in a situation like this it's becoming abundantly obvious that survival skills are what everyone needs. she's trying though, there's no doubt about that. she tried helping with the shelters but it ended with a tangle of ropes and elena rather shamefully making herself scarce before anyone could get too irritated, and now she's shifted her efforts. gathering water is pretty safe, right? right. she can't hunt to save her life, but water doesn't go anywhere. this much she can handle.

whether you run into her on her way back or on her way out is a matter of preference. she'd hardly say no to company on the trip, it's not exactly safe out there. ]

[ WILD CARD ]

[ exploring in the jungle? poking around the tq? something entirely different? hmu with whatever / pm/pp sharknado for any questions!! canon point is roughly mid-season 3 if anyone's curious ]

[familybusiness]

[The sound of movement stops briefly, as if whoever was making it wasn't entirely expecting to hear anything but themselves in here.

It's only for a moment, though, before a male voice calls out, twinged with concern.]

Keep talking, alright? I'll see if I can make my way over to you.

[Being stuck inside the ship wasn't a good thing, with all of the mess and the unsteadiness. Considering the condition of some of the areas, Sam figures he might as well ask:]

Are you hurt?

Algidus | Killer Instinct/Box CRAU | will match formatting

[thecoldshoulder]

[BASE CAMP]

Waking up and realizing that he was stranded on a strange planet without access to his ship and technology and thus no way to get back to his own homeworld was bad enough. Hoisting himself up out of the wreckage and making his way down off the hull of the Tranquility just to realize the only sort of civilization was a shabby mess of tents and makeshift shelters inhabited largely by humans qualified as a damn nightmare to the latest alien arrival. Algidus, the otherworldly being that looked like a monolith made of dark ice, thought initially that his previous captors had whipped up some bizarre hallucination in his mind... but as he moved through the base camp he became convinced of the reality of this latest predicament.

He wasn't planning on sticking around. He had no love for humans and didn't want to give them the chance to plot new ways to try and exploit or harass him; just because this particular group seemed to have access to space travel didn't mean they would be any more diplomatic or considerate of other species. But he was still feeling disoriented from waking up in the grav couches and having to scrabble out of the wreckage of the massive ship on uncooperative limbs, and the heat and humidity of this new planet was doing him little favors. The last thing he felt up to doing was trying to push his way through the unfamiliar jungle that stood just beyond the clearing--not until he'd gotten his feet back underneath himself, at least.

So Algidus searched for what looked to be a currently unoccupied tent and crept into the shady spot it provided, curling up to try and snatch some brief rest before he moved on. The second his keen senses detect someone entering, he raises his head and emits a warning hiss. "Keep your distance and don't try anything. I have had it up to my horns with human games and while you've stumbled upon me on one of the rare times that I don't feel like making an example of my might, I have no qualms when it comes to retaliation!"

[JUNGLE EXPLORATION]

Eventually Algidus has managed to rest somewhat and has decided that he's had his fill of putting up with the sounds of hustle and bustle about the base camp, of being engaged by the other people that have been marooned on this wretched planet. It's good to know that there is a concentrated source of supplies that he could double back to claim for his own should situations become dire, but the alien has always been reclusive; he needs a more secluded area to call his own. Maybe somewhere cooler, too; a body of water or a system of caves... anything better than those crowded tents.

He stalks away from the ramshackle arrangement of tents and shelters, his mind still uneasy. He doesn't want to remain on this planet with these humans any longer than strictly necessary, but he has no idea how he's going to get off of it, either. He didn't crash on this planet and he doesn't remember his people ever making record of it; thus, he has no idea how he's going to reach them. He'd had plans before he'd been taken here--and how did he arrive, was he shipped away by his previous captors to suffer anew, or was he kidnapped again?-- and now they were all crumbling to pieces, getting tossed up with all of the questions he had and resulting in a very confused and troubled mind. He gets a moment of respite from his terrible mood when he pushes through the foliage and sees the glimmering waters of the nearest river, but when he eagerly kneels down next to it to test it and feel its coolness only to discover that it is acidic and not drinkable, the alien of ice feels yet another spike in the frustration that he'd been suffering since the very first second he became aware that he was trapped on this damn planet. The heat and humidity has been hard enough of a creature that thrives in freezing temperatures; failing to find a way to slake his thirst and cool himself off only compounds his previous vexation, which is why he reacts in what could only be described as, well... a massive hissy fit.

"Lousy stupid damned... planet!" Algidus shrieks, springing to his feet and tossing a jagged ball of ice at the nearest piece of foliage--which explodes when it is struck, showering glimmering fragments and pulpy plant matter everywhere. He's so caught up trying to vent that he's not paying attention to any attention he might have garnered or to anyone else that might have similarly been investigating the river. He just carries on his angry ranting, as if pure vitriol could somehow convince the Makers to hear him and take him back to his beloved ice and snow. "If I had my ship and my cell you'd be nothing but a smoking crater!!"

(let's see how this goes without CR between 'em!) - Exploration

[hairrands]

It isn't that AJ had been tracking the alien, or had even known of his existence, but when Algidus erupts in a fit of curses near her position, she feels a surge of fear at first that immediately melts away into cautious concern. That voice sounds familiar, and not for reasons that she likes.

She creeps out from under a massive, fern-like structure to peek down on the treacherous river-line, then freezes in place as she catches the glint off of Algidus' icy carapace. He's another alien like the one that she... or her original, as it would be, had known. She'd known him well.

AJ isn't sure whether Algidus is another member of Glacius' species or not, but that he's out here is enough for her to decide that perhaps he ought to made contact with... still, she waits until the worst of his rageful explosion dies away before she finds a broken vine branch. She hurls it from nearby, aiming to hit him in the leg. "Psst," she hisses, feeling dread and panic warring in her for attempting to make contact. This might be a terrible idea, but she has to know. She... well, she feels like she owes the alien, though which one she hasn't been able to sort out.

Wave Kieadon | original

[shouldbe]

arrival;

[ It takes a moment for Wave to fully awaken. Her body's still adjusting to a newfound decisiveness that had been adapted days before, and at first the groggily thinks she might just return to sleep. But all at once she remembers her purpose, and at the same time wakefulness hits her like a spell by a mage. She realizes that she is not, in fact, lying in her own bed, but seems to be somehow suspended in some sort of liquid and there is something in her throat and Wave gags hard, her hands sweeping upwards only to find solid walls surrounding her.

Panic, pure and hot, rushes through her entire body, but already the tube in her throat is retracting, doors in front of her splitting apart and spilling her out. It's with a shriek that she falls from the tube, curling into a ball and landing hard on knees and elbows and forearms.

But there's no time to pause, no time to try and figure out where she is or what's going on; things are decidedly wrongand rising to her feet Wave realizes how very naked she is and feels the blood in her body rushing to her cheeks as she tries to see if anyone else is there to see her. But nobody is, and Wave realizes that the ambient light she sees by comes from what looks to be a giant hole above her, reachable by broken beams and cables that look dangerous at best.

It's been a long time since Wave's had to rely on her own strength. As she stares at the climb ahead of her it's daunting. ]

Well...

[ She bites her lip, her brow furrowing slightly with worry, but a moment more and she presses her lips together tightly, hands curling into fists at her sides. ]

I wanted this, after all.

[ Though perhaps not in the way things are here.

Climbing up once she's found something to clothe herself with takes time, and by the time Wave reaches the hole at the top her arms are shaking with the effort. She's lost a lot of the strength she once had... however, she can't stop the pleased smile that spreads across her face as she pulls herself out into sunlight, warm on her skin. For a moment she sits, flushed with the exertion of the climb and enjoying just being. But that moment doesn't last long.

Wave takes a deep breath, her uncertainty getting the better of her as she looks around her new surroundings. Now that she's out of the immediate danger, it's beginning to sink in--she's woken up somewhere very obviously far away from home, in the wreckage of something wholly unfamiliar to her, trapped in some sort of tube with another one forced down her throat, with no idea of how she got there. Had she been kidnapped? But then, why had she been left on her own...?

She licks her lips, turning her gaze up to her surroundings again. No better way than to ask, right? ]

Hello? Is anyone out there?

base camp;

[ This is a far cry from the castle she left behind. Wave eyes the spread of tents with some uneasiness, but she's doing her best to approach everything with an open mind. Just as long as she doesn't get stuck playing nursemaid, she'll be all right.

It takes her a little while before she's comfortable enough with her new situation to approach somebody, and even then it takes a deep breath and a set expression before she strides forward. ]

Hello, I'm Wave. I was hoping you could tell me a little more about... this place.

[ Like what its name is, for instance. ]

Base Camp

[tadashiwashere]

[Tadashi looks up, surprise coloring his features for a moment before his expression softens into a sympathetic smile.

Huh. He... hadn't expected more people to show up. It makes him wonder just how safe it is to keep their camp here. And how damaged the jump drive must be at this point. Even with that thought lurking at the edge of his mind, he's not going to suggest a move to everyone until Hiro is found.

He shoves those thoughts aside and sets down the generator he was tinkering with before getting to his feet and offering his hand.]

Tadashi Hamada. And sure. I can do my best. What do you want to know first?

AJ HArris | CRAU OC from Box | I'M A NEWBIE HELLO HI

[hairrands]

A R R I V A L

It's probably the same old song and dance for those survivors coming her way now, but to AJ, this is a fresh, traumatizing new chapter in a string of hellish mishaps. Minutes ago she had been dying. She'd been manipulated into giving herself over to a sentient virus and it had been eating her from the inside out.

Now she's here. Weak as a kitten and about as ready to leap off the side of this twisted metal looking heap of shit, but she's breathing freely, and her head's as empty of whispers and suggestions and smug, conniving commands as the day she was born... It feels good. If she were alone, she'd be feeling really good.

The only thing that keeps her from reaching out to those hollering assholes coming her way is the fact that she thinks they're about to chase her down for food. She doesn't mean the kind she'd carry around in a backpack.

AJ bolts for it, mincing over the sun-scorched hull of the ship until she finds a jag in its side that she thinks will lead to something, anything, anywhere to hide. Her only saving grace is the shard of glass she'd found in medical when she'd fallen out of her little horrible goo-clone pod. At least she's not ass-naked out here; thank fuck for the few lockers that weren't empty.

She's not coming out until someone physically tries to roust her, and then if they do they might just find a shiv to their neck. Weakness around here, wherever this is, is about as likely to go over well for her as it would in the Box... or under it.

B A S E

Oh, AJ will get to know her neighbours, alright.

It's been three days since she skimped down from the side of the ship on her own, climbing the face like a drunken mountain goat and nearly paying the price for it. Her wrist had been sprained when she made that very last jump down to the loamy earth... or whatever this soil's planet was named after, and when she'd finally found water to dunk it in to cool it down, she'd recoiled almost immediately from the way it bit into her.

Fucking death trap, this jungle shit heap hell hole.

Since when was that ever different?

Just as in her previous experience, picking away at what this shanty town has put together is the best that she's come to finding a way to survive, and she's done so mostly by darting out in the gloaming of morning and during strategic points in the day when most of the scary looking fucks have either gone back to the ship or out into the wild green yonder. So far it's been working, but maybe this time she's gotten a little too cocky.

AJ is not the kind to grin and simper and make fake pleasantries when caught red-handed, but barring outright being chased down, she's going to keep ahold of what she's grabbed. "Finders keepers," she spits, those being the first words to make it from her head out of her mouth.

...Alright, so it's probably not the most airtight defence she could have come up with, but her brains have been addled by the heat and the fact that she's in some alien jungle far from home, and is waiting for the hammer to fall. She's got bigger problems... and she's also about to dart off again to coin a new phrase: sprinters minters, though she'll be damned if she yells that out.

base!

[judex]

Fenris raises his eyebrows.

He's both more and less a shocking sight than he could be—to the extent he could ever be shocking to someone who's been dragged through multiple worlds, anyway—with no shirt to hide the full curling pattern of white brands over his arms and chest, but enough dirt to turn the bright white of the markings and his hair a more acceptable dusty color. Underneath the dirt he's got enough ferocious disdain to rise to match the woman's spitting. He was already in a foul mood, anyway. Stereotypes about elves right into the bin: Fenris hates the blighted wilderness.

She has his knife. 'His' knife. The knife he's claimed, out of many available knives, for jobs too small and detaily for the sword strapped to his back.

"That is not," he says, "how we do things here."

Roy Mustang | Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

[weaponsgrade]

base camp

[Ramshackle is one word for it. For a long moment, Roy stands in the sun -- off the side of the main thoroughfare because why get in anyone's way -- and looks upward. He hasn't even been here long enough to figure this place out and he's already decided he hates it. Who wouldn't, honestly?

(It's the Gate messing with him. Truth being an absolutely asshole because that's what Truth is. He knows it.)

For all the he had only intended to saunter through the encampment, hands deep in pockets and trying to look unaffected by it all, he soon found himself pulled aside and told in no uncertain terms that if he didn't make himself useful watching over this pot of stew, he would regret it come mealtime.

And then his stomach gurgled when he'd tried to refuse, so there he is: standing over a pot of stew, carefully tending the fire (in a completely non-alchemical way, thanks very much) and staring at the pot like it's the reason for all the confusion.]

All right, you bastard. [He's still looking at the pot. It might be construed as talking to the stew.] Game's over. Show yourself and let's get this over with.

[Giant hallucination cooked up by Truth? More believable than actually being here.

Now if only the stew would answer... ]

[ontheline]

[In the distance, there is hustle and bustle of others who have found themselves dropped into the horrible world of 'Random Alien Planet', and surely there are those around them that are comforting and informing them of how utterly crappy their situation is. There — ah, can you hear it? It's distant but growing more audible by the minute. If one focuses their hearing just right:

"—and I managed to salvage one of my favorite pictures of all! This was a special family picture day with me and the girls; my wife's wearing her favorite dress, and papa got Elicia a stuffed bear she couldn't put down for even a moment! I swear she carried that little guy with her even to bed, for weeks and weeks; isn't that precious?! Ah, it was completely awful when she misplaced it; but good ol' daddy was on the case! I'm an investigator after all, so how could I not put all my resources into tracking the missing Mr. Bear—?!"

Yep, ghost on the wind. Giant hallucination. Carry on with your stew.]

the dag. mad max.

[justthewind]

ARRIVAL;

[ There's a woman -- a girl, really -- and she's running.

Her bare feet slap damp on the wide expanse of the ship's exposed shell, wearing drapery that was once white and is now stained blue, slapping at her legs. Her hair is much the same, flying in rat tails tinged cyan, swinging wild as she sprints. Her red mouth grimaces, exposing her teeth, and she seems motivated by both fright and instinct. She runs like someone not very accustomed to running, all wild angles and heavy foot falls.

And then she stops, bare feet sliding on metal, arms flung out to keep her own balance, and her eyes snap wider at what she sees upon approaching the sloping edge. What she sees is the impossibly wide path cleaved into the landscape, mud and exposed rock veined through all the impossible green. ]

Did we choose the road, [ comes out at a rush, a breathless whisper. ] Did the road choose us.

EXPLORATION;

[ Trees are for climbing.

Not like the trees the Dag has seen before -- they weren't like this, and she thinks maybe this is what they could have been like. But they used those trees, sucked them dry, made them grow skinny like the Wives themselves. Knobbly and pliant. These are wild, with strong indifferent arms, but she hugs them anyway as she climbs, her boots rubbing bark off beneath her weight, leaves quivering. Her legs wrap around a thick branch, and she hooks the handmade basket into place. Her hair is braided back, and she's comfortable in close-fitted jumpsuit.

The vines are growing thick, here, hard to find as they are, and she begins the task of ruthlessly picking them of their seed pods, only eating when one looks specifically like it wants to be eaten. She lists forward, reaching for another sturdy vine, her weight tilted, and then abruptly--

She catches herself before she slips, a rough cry leaving her mouth, the muscles in her stomach all tensing at once, and she barely notices that the basket has slipped free until she hears it crash on the forest floor below. Her dismayed hiss; ] Pignut.

[ But she senses someone else nearby, and she remains clinging to the branch like a defensive feline, squeezing it between her thighs, her hands splayed wide, fingers clawed. The Dag listens hard for several seconds, the jungle's life chirping and clicking and rustling all around her, before impatience takes over; ]

Oi!

slides in here

[theroadwarrior]

[Did you know fate brings people together, just like it had brought Max to the wives in the first place? No? Actually Max doesn't believe in fate at all; that's probably more something vuvalini or even Dag would believe far more than himself. He thinks things just happen simply because they happen, and the world is smaller than people think. Or in this case, the universe.

Case in point: the basket falls, it hits someone on the head, and a litany of incoherent curses drift up into the tree tops. Some parts include gems like fuck and shit, but mostly it is a nonsensical ramble that is a unique little song and dance from feral men with a penchant for growling, mumbling, and driving fast cars.

Max's head snaps up to glower at the tree tops, a small little trail of blood on his hairline to his chin.

HOW DARE, his expression says.

Where are you, random basketcase?

So he can probably point and complain about keeping your shit to yourself--!]

ellie | the last of us | reapp from a thousand years ago

[endureandsurvive]

ARRIVAL

[There's nothing new about waking up to a tube jammed down her throat, to the shift of movement, even the insulated sound of the alarm - something's fucked up, what else is new? - and then the pod opens. The part where she doesn't so much slough out of the blue jello and instead drops like a stone the distance to the far side of the corridor, all pretense of suspension out of the picture, is pretty goddamn novel. You know, like a crappy downer book that haunts you for a little bit. (Get it?)

Ellie lands with a wet cr-SMACK, half crunch and half just wet - on her side and shoulder instead of on her head or straight down onto a locked leg. Give her like three seconds and she'll be pretty okay with that. Right now--:]

Motherfucker!

EXPLORATION

[She's pretty sure it's her imagination, but it's like she can feel every breath of wind coming up from the canyon through the groaning deck of the ship - like a subtle shift in the wall-turned-floor under foot every couple of steps that she can feel in her bones even if she can't hear it over the wail of medical bay's alarm. Sticking around the precariously suspended ship goes against some very basic instincts (mostly the one that doesn't want to go careening over a cliff's edge to her pasty death), but like hell she's going to get too far into the friggin' jungle or hang around that sad sack basecamp without trying to get her hands on as much equipment as she can.

Somewhere out there she has a stockpile of crap. She just has to find the right floor. The right door. Has to hope the scrambled nanites on her arm are still working--

She hadn't exactly made it that far though. For a time she'd stood at the elevator shaft where the lifts had once been, shining her flashlight from one side to the other: scanning the dark, hollow sounding shaft turned corridor. Standing there, a slow prickle of fear had risen in her chest - had swollen - had rooted her to the spot. How many monsters were still left out there? How many people that shouldn't be alive could still be lurking around? The last time she'd gone out into some dark corridor, she'd--]

Man, screw this.

[And had clicked off her flashlight.

Which is why now, thanks to being a chickenshit or maybe just better judgement, she can still be found in the medical bay instead of trying to explore the bowels of the precariously balanced ship. Not for nothing though: she's got a length of metal in hand, clearly snapped off from one of the ruined pieces of equipment in one of the exam rooms, and is at present trying to use it to lever into some of the fucked over lockers.]

WILDCARD

[Throw something at me! I'll roll with anything but if you care to hash out details first just shoot me a PM.]

Hello fellow cursy-mcswearpants!

[hairrands]

It just so happens that Ellie's made it back to the medical bay at around the same time that AJ, a string-bean of a survivor with similar inclinations to hoard, has decided to try digging into the metal innards of this relic ship for herself. It means that while she's in the process of climbing down through the side of the hull to those familiar grav couches, she hears metal on metal and freezes, suspended among the loose floor grating and exposed wires she'd been monkeying down.

A normal person would have asked who was there, but AJ listens like a mouse just out of sight of a cat, heart thumping in her chest. She tries to make herself silent, moving in the harsh light piercing down from above to secret herself where she can watch the girl prying open busted locker doors. If she currently looks like a rat-nested bag of bones, it's only because she hasn't washed or combed for days and has been relying on scraps she could steal from the base camp that other people had come by honestly. Right about now this teenager looked like she's alone, and maybe she has some experience with finding shit. AJ purses her lips and considers the probabilities of pouncing her and wrenching that metal rod away from her, weighed against how much of a fight she might be able to put up... providing that Ellie doesn't catch sight of her first.

When she gets a chance, AJ moves a little closer, trying her luck now and again to find a silent way to close the distance.

wanda maximoff » mcu

[consequencing]

arrival.

[ she's sluggish as she lands bodily on the wall opposite.

not just because of her limbs - though that comes with it's own disadvantage as she slowly picks herself up off of the floor- wall. it's more than that, an absence felt as keenly as a pressure against her temples, the moments before a headache where something is wrong but you can't quite place your finger on what it is yet. she isn't powerless, it's nothing so dramatic enough, but the difference is enough that she can feel it keenly in every movement.

still there is enough going on that she can focus on something else - for the moment at least. figuring out exactly what works and what doesn't, how far she can test things, it's not a priority. what is a priority is the loud groans of a precariously balanced wreck, finding clothes, and finding an exit. with a deep breath, shaking knees and a soft mutter under her breath she starts to move, not out of the dangerous ship just yet but further in. there may lie answers there yet. ]

-

[ later as she does emerge, fully clothed in a simple and pretty damaged dress that someone abandoned in what used to be the locker room. she's still dripping with the blue fluid, hair hanging in matted locks, and once she emerges into the sun she pauses for a moment and stares at the sky. ]

This is not where I started.

[ she makes the comment, clearly unnecessary, to no one in particular, and then raises a hand to crumple enough of the hull that she has a clear path to the ground. it takes a lot more out of her than it used to, and already out of breath she drops to a seated position as she stares at her hands. so that explains the feeling then. god only knows what is going wrong with her right now, but one thing it definitely is is wrong. staring at her hands - or more accurately, the little red sparks and waves drifting away from her fingertips - doesn't change the fact that she already feels completely sapped of her energy though, and after a minute she lets her hands fall back to her sides and stands instead. ]

Something is wrong. [ again this is obvious, but this time she speaks with more purpose, looking around for someone to demand answers from. for people who know of it her accent is strong, eastern european, and as she spots a humanoid shaped body she rounds on them as quickly as she can manage in her currently drained state. ] What did they do to me?

[shouldbe]

[ Wave's been waiting on top of the ship since she got out; not waiting for anyone in particular, but waiting for the strength to return to her arms before she begins trying to figure out how to get back down to the ground. She's been sitting on the hull, enjoying the feeling of sunlight on her face... but she isn't expecting anybody else to come out of the ship.

So when another young woman exits, Wave is a little too stunned to say anything. She watches as the woman raises her hand and the hull crumples in response--a mage, then.

But then she drops herself, and Wave scrambles up to see if she can help. She reaches her just in time to hear the question: "What did they do to me?" ]

What did who do to you?

[ Her words are quiet but inquisitive, trying not to startle the other girl too much. ]

Whoever it is that brought us here? Or someone else?

Jackson Whittemore | Teen Wolf (CR AU from Exit Void)

[adoptalizard]

[A] WAKEY WAKEY, NO EGGS AND BACON OR UNDIES;

[ while there was a whole metric fuck-ton of things that were horrible about being held by COMPASS, at least none of them were waking up naked while covered in blue slime, as someone retracts something cylinderic and long from your throat. yeah, this is a whole new level of fucking weird. jackson hits the opposite wall of the med bay with a thud, and a drawn out groan, but quickly begins to check his surroundings. still dizzy, vision still swimming, his head snaps around, looking for immediate threats. like marco-polo pool monsters, or space zombies, or floating brains, or legitimate human-sacrificing cultists. none, as of yet, so he's checking his person instead - some of the acid wounds are still gradually clearing, but there's one serious issue he's more concerned with than any of the where-the-hell-am-i issues.

he is super naked. ]

I spent... [ jackson rasps out, coughing and hacking for a moment as his voice coming through his throat feels more like dragging sandpaper over a wound. ugh. ] ...a freaking year getting those four coordinating, complete, undamaged, unbloodstained outfits together. [ he's pushing himself up, still wobbling, but making his way towards standing, as he grunts out a string of, well, complaints, with growing volume. ] I fought dinosaurs and underwater zombies and David Bowie for that wardrobe.

[ as he finally gets to upright, and looks like he's running off of pure indignation and rage at this point, jackson's voice builds up to a furious roar, looking up like he's screaming at the ceiling itself. or, wall that is now acting as the ceiling. ]

Give my damn clothes back, COMPASS, you douchebags!

[B] BASE CAMP;

[ he's not coated in blue goo anymore, but the last couple weeks in Zelien that Jackson had just come off of didn't offer much ease for basics like shaving. not that anything in Zelien was every with ease, but after the first few months, some things had been worked out for basic needs. before everything went to shit and buildings started, you know, eating people. suffice to say, barring the attempt at combat-knife shaving, jackson's looking a little on the rougher side. his hair isn't even styled into magical perfection. it's a tragedy.

but showering - that he'd like to do. or at least bathing. something cleaner than the jump into a stream he did to get the blue junk off. for that, though, he needs something more cleansing than stream water. ]

Please tell me someone has something at least resembling soap here. [ jackson's questioning the first group of people who look like they've been here a while. ] And we're not all trying a tragic group bonding exercise through community B.O.?

[C] EXPLORATION;

[ he actually misses zelien. how screwed up is that? he misses wesley bitching at him, and chief making him run laps, and hell, he misses scott, that dopey loser. jackson hadn't realized how attached he'd grown to them (to having people - to not being alone), and it's starting to not only weird him out, but concern him. there's no one here who knows him. not really - not the him that spent a year surviving hell. square one, and all that crap.

so - food. food gathering. sustenance. basic bodily needs. the kind of crap chief would ramble at him about. that's where he's starting.

too bad he freaking sucks at this hunter/gatherer shit, and it's mostly just dissolved into Jackson wandering through the forest, dragging his feet nosily, and sighing loudly like the petulant teenager he is. anything he might have been able to catch is probably long gone. he might, in fact, be so busy sulking that he trips over a root and falls flat on his face. feel free to laugh. ]

[D] CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE;

[ wiiillddcaarrdddd idk hit me. ]

c, rescues romantically

[workout]

[ Crash landing on a planet has its pros and cons. The biggest pro is that they have real air and plants that aren't linked up to a bunch of pipes; and, for the first time in weeks, Scott's finally gotten the chemical burn of the medbay out of his nose. That changes when the new arrivals show up and drag it with them from the wreckage, and he ends up smelling Jackson before he hears him.

He doesn't recognize him from either. Even days from the jump, the chemical scent's ingrained in skin, enough that it obscures any chance of familiarity. But a newbie in the jungle is always potential for disaster, so Scott heads towards the commotion just in time to see someone vaguely familiar fall flat on their face.

It could be a weird twin situation. This guy looks rougher, for a start, though camping has that effect. Scott takes a deep inhale once he's closer, and by the time he's leaning over to offer Jackson a hand up he's still only fifty percent sure of what he's seeing. Or smelling, or whatever. ]

You okay?

[ Brow furrowed, voice equal parts concerned and bemused. ]

Toast the Knowing | Mad Max: Fury Road

[anti_seed]

ARRIVAL-ISH

[She screams.

Or curses. Hard to tell which or what exactly: it's garbled from shock and hard to make out afterward, because the tiny woman whirls around on her bare feet, and the shotgun in her hand erupts with a reflexive squeeze of her finger. The muzzle flashes brilliant. Leaves an afterimage bright neon against the muggy gloom of the overturned Tranquility. Pellets spark off the wall (floor) four or five inches from your head, but there's a crawling sensation on your shoulder that either means you were grazed or that was adrenaline buzzing through your body.]

Get back or here's more for you! [Her voice is high. She scuttles backward til her shoulder hits the bulkhead, and her slimy hands are shaking badly but she manages to pump the second round into place anyway. Through the jagged hole high above, the sun highlights her short hair and wild eyes, the sodden white fabric sticking to her arms.

Most people climb out, first thing. But Toast spent a long time preparing in the bowels of a dark, stone-boned monolith once before. The habit isn't gone from her now.]

---

BASE CAMP

This is amazing.

[It's seeds fried up in a dubious fat mixture along with gizzards and the other pieces of lizard that taste acrid and subtly off when eaten on their own, but Toast is cramming her palm into her mouth like she's never seen food before, fork neglected. Toast doesn't tend to be effusive with her praise, exactly, but her eyes hold real meaning as she looks across to the chef, real compliments, and maybe something deeper than that. This food feels like a kept promise.

And more than just proper payment for help around with carrying water and harvest, too. Nobody where she comes from thinks in terms of payment, anyway.]

You going to eat that? [She's tiny. Most adults, she barely comes up to their chins. But there's more than enough work to do, at this camp; people have been talking about building upward, into the trees. Give her the food, and it'll go somewhere.]

randomly does stuff shhh shhh

[theroadwarrior]

[THAT'S MY HEAD—

There are pellets from a shotgun bouncing everywhere, and Max really does not want to deal with this today, jesus christ alive. He barely manages to not get himself shot, out of her line of sight enough that he thinks he can scoop her up and get her to at least stop shooting in the direction of people. SO HERE HE COMES. He reaches around and pretty much gets her into a tight hug from behind, and she's so short even compared to him that he can just... y'know, pluck her straight up and have her hang in his great hug-wrestling-move. The shotgun is sort of squished, between his arms and hers, not at a good angle for her to shoot it anymore.

Wow, actually, you seem familiar. That hair and the colors and whatnot.]

Hey! Calm down.

[It's a bark, firm but not vicious, more authoritative.

No reason to shoot right now, lady...

Um, who is looking very close to someone he knows.

Hrmm.]

Marcus Flavius Aquilus | The Eagle (film)

[disruptus]

Arrival

[He should probably yell.

There are people around this ruined tower, their voices carrying and bouncing echoes around, much more like the weird ghost words and memories that had traveled over the moorlands of Britain than anything like the way sound travels inside even the largest Principia. They could help him, probably. The people above; maybe even some from below, if they're climbing. But he doesn't call for help.

Instead, he dangles.

The stretch of muscle is beginning to burn inside his arm. He listens to the thud of his heart inside his ears, four or five times faster than the erratic drip of water off something metal above. The floor is perhaps twenty cubits below now, not far enough to kill him, but the possibility of landing on his leg -- it bites at his nerves, which are already raw from the pain radiating up through the muscle of his left leg. The pain doesn't worsen when he wiggles his sandaled foot, but there's a distinct new twinge when he kicks forward to swing himself closer to the wall.

Thus, it's with his other foot that he lands his next hold. An idiotic, puppyish scrabble of leather on damp metal, his free hand skittering madly over the curvature of metal. He gets his fingers in a shallow crease-- some kind of molding? sculpture? -- and it works for the space of a breath. He grits his teeth, and pulls.]

---

Exploration

[The spear clips the slender tree. Nicks the outermost edge of the vivid target painted on the dark trunk, but it's at least four inches off from center. No doubt, in the breadth of an animal's body, that would be a wounding hit if not a deadly one. Nonetheless, Marcus frowns intently as he goes to retrieve the shaft.

He yanks it out of the earth. There are already twelve, thirteen holes plugged into the sod around it. His other throws hadn't even come close.

The carved wood comes away a little clotted but none the worse for wear, under his inspection that follows. Marcus runs a finger along the side of it, and his scowl deepens; it's a good grain, solid. He doesn't know nearly as much about crafting weapons as he does about killing things with them, but he thinks he can recognize a waste of good material when he's screwed it up, and he's quite sure that he has. The whole thing has come out all funny and warped, knobbly in subtle ways that the equipment endowed to the Legions never were, something weird about the weight, or-- perhaps the density? He shakes his head, a sigh shifting through his big shoulders. He isn't self-conscious about his work, though. The audible crack and rustle of approaching footfalls behind him elicits nothing worse than a look over his shoulder.]

Firewood, [he says, lifting the spear to present it. His carving tools are sitting on the stump behind him.] If you are collecting.

exploration

[requisition]

[Dutch shrugs slightly in a way that's demonstrative of the rifle set on the tilt of her hip.]

I'm not.

[But it's amicable, not offended by the idea that might be what she's out here for. If she hadn't been interested in conversation, she wouldn't have made any noise in approaching - would have skirted right around his makeshift range and carried on into the jungle. But the sound of the spear striking through the air and his subsequent inspection had caught her curiosity. It wasn't like everyone came out into the jungle, let alone to try making weapons.]

Looks like you've been doing this for a while.

[The kind of observation that comes before a suggestion, but she still hasn't decided quite what - if he wants help, or a break, or maybe an upgrade to moving targets. If he's even the sort to be open to suggestions at all.]

DUTCH | killjoys

[requisition]

arrival

[It had taken her nearly no time at all to start moving. The disorientation and plain weirdness of waking up in a goo-filled pod with a breathing tube shoved down her throat hadn't caused any slowness, mostly because all the answers her brain could supply for the situation equalled absolutely nothing good. If this was a Company effort to capture Westerly refugees, or another trick from Khylen, or something to do with finding D'avin, she wasn't going to wait around for anyone to notice that she'd gotten free. Though with the state of the place, she had the feeling loose prisoners wouldn't be first priority.

Still covered in blue goo, dressed in the first piece of clothing she'd seen (some kind of jumpsuit, two sizes too big and rolled up at the ankles and sleeves to make up for it), she'd felt the brush of fresh air on her face and headed for it immediately, forcing limbs that still felt half asleep to carry her up the frame of fallen debris and loose cabling, into the sunlight.

She's a little out of breath at the top, body still protesting how she'd woken up let alone the effort she'd just pushed it through. It'll ease. In the moment, she can brace her hands on her knees and look over the huge jungle stretching as far as the eye can see, the crash path torn into the earth, the giant ship under her feet.

It's absolutely beautiful, and none of it looks like anything that could be found in the quad.]

Oh, hell.

[It's almost reverent.]

base camp

[The local wildlife is cautious, set on edge by the ruckus of a gigantic spaceship crashing in the neighbourhood. Something that will probably even out, given enough time for it to become part of the landscape, for the jungle to reclaim the torn up land and consume the ship. Dutch thinks it's an inevitability, especially with the sounds the ship makes daily, a constant promise of how it will one day tumble over that cliff. She's also hoping she won't be here when that inevitability arrives.

In the meantime, they still need to eat. Hunting animals isn't the same as tracking down warrants, but the same skills apply. She just doesn't usually have as much regret related to how cute her targets are.]

We could keep these as bug repellent. [She says it idly as she sets down a bundle of fifteen of the red flying lizards next to the nearest cooking fire, all dead, strung together by their tails for easier transport back through the jungle. She's been gone for two days, this time. Something about staying in the camp makes her uneasy, reminds her of who isn't there, of how all their work is going into settling rather than getting away. But that doesn't mean she's adverse to making friends.] Unless someone's finally found some nets?

base camp

[fadesteps]

No nets.

[ trevelyan seems put out by this; nets would have been very helpful. the insects are proving far more troublesome here than anything she's used to; persistent, noisy, and prone to nip, which is the worst, as far as she's concerned. the itch is absolutely terrible. ]

Trying to catch each single one is tiring and entirely fruitless, since the moment you have one, another takes its place. On the other hand, it's improving my — [ a pause, as she sharply flicks her wrist to zap another approaching insect with a small bolt of electric magic, which she has been using here quite liberally. the aversion to it she knows from home does not seem to be broadly shared by anyone here, an oddly comforting thing amongst the strangeness. she can't help the faintly smug twitch at the corner of her mouth, as if she's achieved something entirely useful (she hasn't, really). ] — aim.

[ turning her attentions to dutch, she eyes the haul with equal measures of curiosity and admiration. the faintest of revulsion, too, as she never enjoyed killing animals, herself — frankly, she never "enjoyed" killing anyone or anything, but her circumstances are particular, and she has long since accustomed herself to the necessity of it, if nothing else. she'd probably go mad, if she didn't. trevelyan nods at the lizards with interest. ]

Is it the smell that repels them? [ thoughtfully, ] Hopefully not one that'll repel the entire camp.

esca mac cunoval | the eagle

[brigante]

Base Camp

[He doesn't know that most of these people are used to better living conditions. Their tents and huts pieced together from fabric and sticks and mud, they're more familiar to him than the metal shell that Esca crawled from. This could almost be his village. Almost.

He doesn't know these people, but that hardly matters when he's lost his own. Esca watches for a short while before approaching the nearest campfire, crouching to take over the cleaning of whatever they've managed to hunt. If he ends up with blood and gore on his hands, it doesn't seem to bother him.

It's the price you pay for eating.]

Exploration

[The jungle smells only a little like the woods he knows. It's damp, but there's a heat to it that he's unfamiliar with. He pushes some of the greenery aside, eyes often wary and uplifted at the sound of some unfamiliar bird or animal. The path behind him isn't clear, but he's good enough at tracking that he'll find his way back.

He stops when he reaches a stream, crouches at the very edge and waits for the fish to come. He doesn't have a spear or even a net, but he doesn't need one. He's been catching fish with his bare hands since he was a boy.]

Come on, then. Just a little tickle.

[Here's hoping he isn't rewarded with a missing finger or two.]

exploration

[manifastdestiny]

What're you doing?

[She's planted on the other side of the water, and she wasn't following him. Deadset. Capable only just glimpsed him now, crouching over the water, looking pretty good and deadset himself in the way he's got his eyes clapped on those waters. Talking to himself. Just a tickle.

She stays on her feet and doesn't match him, wary curious in the way she watches. There is little she is afraid of, here. Everything seems sweet. Shell probably learn, she knows; there are always things you gotta be afraid of, or for, but she's good at running and getting better.]

What's in there?

inquisitor trevelyan ( dragon age )

[fadesteps]

— arrival

[ she's had enough of waking up in decidedly unusual and uncomfortable circumstances to last her a lifetime, even if she can count the actual number of instances on one hand. it's still more than she needs. the novelty of waking, this time, with something jammed down her throat, however, is one that she did not realise she ever wanted to experience until right now.

all around her, metal. that's what she feels beneath her bare hands and knees when she topples out, the sting of impact fizzling through her bones as a slight grimace passes over her face. she's had worse, she comforts herself with that, even though the phantom sensation in her throat remains all the same. her marked hand glows, briefly, as she lifts it to rub lightly at the skin of her neck. blink and you'll miss it. her rapidly clearing vision tells her that she is inside... something. the liquid still on her skin feels immensely unpleasant. light filters down from above, and she scrambles to her feet, inelegantly and slowly, towards it. the glare of sunlight blinds her once more when she's out, but the warmth of it is strangely soothing, even if heavy humidity follows quickly after it. all around her is a place she doesn't recognise, one she can barely have imagined, even by combining together images of all the places she'd known in thedas. ]

Maker. [ oaths are always of use, even when the religion itself glazes somewhat over you. her voice is hoarse and low. ] Where am I? [ and after a cursory glance down at herself, more indignant than anything else, alarmed by the injustice of it all, ] And where are my clothes?

[ by which measure, if anyone has seen her emerge from the ship, they will promptly see her disappear back down to try and find some way to cover herself up more effectively, now that her body is sort of in agreement with her mind, once more. at the very least, her body's complaints aren't being listened to, no matter how ungainly her movements. whether she is found within the ship once more or as she is making her way gingerly into the jungle, she has found herself a jumpsuit, which is uncomfortable and peculiar and sticks too close to her skin, but it's better than being practically naked. ]

— exploration

[ once trevelyan has felt that she can do all she can at the camp site (heal small wounds, tend to fires and provide cooling breezes during the worst of the daytime heat), her curiosity and frustration get the better of her. her magic feels stilted, limited by something that she can't put her finger on. the anchor feels almost as though it has disappeared from her hand; even the fade is far from here. the most she can tell so far is that she is very, very far from home. from all of thedas, from poor, tattered skyhold. she'd not even had time to take stock of the place in its entirety before waking up here. despite the obvious distance, however, she wants nothing more than to find herself a staff.

the likelihood of finding one on the ruins of the ship — very unlike any ships she has ever travelled upon in thedas, for sure — seem very low to her, but she has nothing to lose. others have related that they've found or else been given belongings from their many homes before, and the possibility that she might find something of use in this ship piques her. at the very least, something to swing about and hit things with. she misses her staff, at least, for that quality of it.

after conjuring up a small flame to light her way, the insides of the ship seem much gloomier and far more bare than they did when she first awoke in it. the sun doesn't quite reach inside the same way, positioned elsewhere in the sky this time. she hopes she won't get lost, and tells herself firmly not to get carried away with her explorations. the ship is absurdly enormous; she would rather face the biting insects and heat of the jungle than be swallowed by the bowels of this beast. after almost an hour's fruitless picking through battered lockers, fighting her way inside doors that are crumpled and unwilling to cooperate with her, a yelp of pleased surprise echoes around what she believes to be the empty ship. ]

Oh, yes! [ it is a keeper staff, ice based,far lowlier than anything that she is used to wielding now, but beggars cannot be choosers, and trevelyan is overjoyed. an incredulous laugh passes her lips. ] Whoever is smiling down on me, be it luck, fate or Andraste herself, thank you.

exploration (& sorry I'm late!)

[judex]

[ Fenris isn't here looking for weapons. He already has several: a sword and a knife back at the campsite, and at the moment, a gun. After more than a year away from home, he's adapted at least that well. He wears his jumpsuit as comfortably as he used to wear armor.

Still no shoes, though. He's nearly silent while he picks his way through the wreckage, but not because he's trying to be. When he hears someone laugh and thank Andraste nearby, his derisive noise is loud enough to carry. ]

She would have done better not to allow you to be brought here at all.

[ He has to drop down a level of sideways-skewed lockers, landing half-crouched, to see her. Her and her staff. His eyes glint in the dark like a cat's, but it's hard to tell which direction they're pointed, the way they catch on that staff specifically. He exhales.

He's also adapted well enough not to dive right into calling someone a snake. ]

john "oxford" buchanan ( original / long time no see, ax )

[romanticism]

— arrival

[ not again. not again, not again, not again. he feels it, knows it far too well, lived through it too many times. maybe if he keeps his eyes closed, pinches himself hard enough, he'll wake up and it'll be gone. he'll be in his bed. except, oxford realises, after the first moment of alarm (of anger), that he's stuck between a rock and a hard place, because he's not coming here like he did before. from a job and community of people he admired and appreciated. he's coming from a prison within his own home. the memory of it becomes suddenly as sharp and clear in his head as the habitual headache that comes with a jump, but right at that moment, he stumbles from the pod and to the floor.

or quite possible against a wall. coughing and spluttering, oxford immediately rubs stasis fluid away from his eyes, blinking rapidly as he shakes his head from side to side, looking here and there, all around himself, at a picture that's familiar but not the same. it's the tranquility, all right, but not as he knows it. knew it. in the corner of his eye he spots the light; his fury dissipates into surprise, and he moves on a kind of autopilot more than anything as he searches for something to wear in the debris. soon enough, he's blinking and squinting in the sun, breathing what feels like surprisingly real, fresh air. the ship has landed — or rather, crashed. he wonders how, and why, and whether he can secretly admire whoever made it happen. he shouldn't take pleasure in it, it's very nearly malicious of him. but not quite. it's an oddly sad thing, to see her collapsed and broken like this. odder still to see her from the outside. ]

That's fantastic. [ a short, mirthless laugh bubbles out of his throat. ] Absolutely wonderful.

[ as oxford distractedly zips the jumpsuit up from his waist (bloody, bloody jumpsuits), he glances down at his chest. taylor's handiwork is still there, on his chest; the tattoo, as fresh as though it had been put upon his body just days ago. how long since he was last here? what of any of the people he once knew here, considered his friends? it's a lot to take in, and his head aches still. with a sigh, he sits himself upon the edge of the hole he can climbed through, taking a moment to catch his breath, stare across at the expansive, endless jungle before him. ]

— base camp

[ his spirits aren't exactly good, but they're not quite bad either. better than on any of his many previous arrivals, strangely enough, so much that he can pretend with far more ease than normal to be a cool and composed character. he helps where he can, in finding food, materials, exploring the area. keeps himself active, to stop himself from thinking too deeply about the implications of being here again. the thought that now he wouldn't return to something better, can't long for it in the same way that he used to. he's not sure whether that's comparatively good for his health, but he'll take it. it's more comforting to feel this way than how he used to feel here. the fact that there's fresh air, ground beneath him, sky above, that helps.

his habit of being everywhere at once is becoming quite a talent. whether he's helping someone carry salvaged materials, chopping wood or putting up another tent, his capacity for activity seems ceaseless. which is why it's surprising that for once, he is dozing during the midday heat in some shade, leant up against a tree. sitting with his back against it, arms folded across his chest (bare, because it's obscenely hot and he doesn't like to sweat all over the little clothing he has to his name), looking strangely serene. whether you intend to wake him or are just passing by, he's only in the lightest of slumbers; something'll bring him back, one way or the other. ]

base camp.

[puppydogeyes]

[The sounds of approach aren't of a single person, two feet and boots through the low grass that's started growing at the edges of the trees. It's two feet and boots, a few sets of four paws, the low sounds of dog breath. Taylor doesn't say anything, and if any of the dogs are inclined to leap on Oxford's sleeping form then they are gently held back. Instead it's the drop and shift of a body settling down next to him, close to his side in a familiarity born from a very long (if patchy) history and an inclination for contact which she may one day have to admit has been heightened by the newer abilities growing in her mind.]

Looking busy.

[She says, dry, but if he opens his eyes he'll see she's tipped her head back against the tree trunk, seeming just as ready to doze through the high sun as him.]

Anya ( the 100 )

[odon]

[ ARRIVAL ]

[ Help? She doesn't need help. She doesn't even know where she is, or how she got here, but she doesn't need more people handling her, sticking needles in her, nor shoving tubes down her throat for that matter. The moment she manages to regain some semblance of balance, even if only barely, she's already crawling onto her feet, and trying to find the quickest way out of wherever she is.

She doesn't know... doesn't understand. This, all of it - it makes no sense.

She was done. She was done.

She lacks her clothes, undressed and feeling exhausted and worn out in a way that reminds her a little too much of when she'd been locked up in Mount Weather. And to add to that, she doesn't have her weapons. So naturally, the first thing she thinks about is finding something that she can use as one. Anything that's either heavy, or sharp - ideally both.

And more than likely, that's how people will find her, either still naked and inside what's left of the ship, or out in the forest, having already managed to find a few pieces of clothing to put on. ]

[ BASE CAMP ]

[ It's not nearly as bad as some of the places she's been in before; but that doesn't mean she likes it. In fact, if this world looked anything like the world she knew, she would've taken off on her own a long time ago.

The urge to do so is still very much there, in fact. She's managed to find some proper clothes now, and has been collecting items here and there to serve as weapons too. She'll work on that with time, but for the moment, it would have to do. So she can be found usually sitting by herself, away from any groups, watching with an all too wary expression, neither hoping nor expecting to find anyone here that she knows. In her hand, she holds some kind of sharp object, looking as close to a knife as she could manage... just in case. ]

[ EXPLORATION ]

[ She may be sticking around the camp, at least for now, but that doesn't mean she's going to sit there and wait for things to work themselves out. At the very least she'll try to get to know this place, learn its dangers and advantages, and hopefully find something to eat. Lacking the face paint from home, she uses some muddy dirt to better hide herself as she makes her way through the woods, her hand keeping a heavy pipe from the ship in hand, should she need to defend herself, a sharpened spear tied to her back, and a couple of smaller weapons similar to knives strapped to her waist.

At the very least, she won't be caught unprepared.

As for the ship - she doesn't have any particular interest to step in there. But she can be found near the debris at times, right at the edge of where metal starts, debating on whether the risk of getting trapped in there is worth it, for the sake of finding some supplies that she might need. ]

basecamp; omg anya hello!!

[romancekiller]

[there's a bit of familiarity to this from what clarke finds herself remembering as weeks have passed since they crash landed on this planet. building shelter, gathering food and water while scavenging for more resources if there's anything else out in the jungle or on even on the ship just to survive.

it's like a weird sense of deja vu between the remnants of memories that flash in her mind. she's done this before which is clear enough for her but aside from her own name and knowing her capabilities as a medic, the amnesia still hasn't let up though she knows she's not the only one at least. clarke was helping out people with whatever they needed for the most part and eventually she was heads on her way back to her tent and that's whe she spots anya just up ahead. it's hard not to when she's sitting off on her own away from everyone else.

for a split second, there's look of recognition in her expression before it fades because even though it's like she knows her, clarke can't seem to place her at all which is yet another thing she seems to be drawing up a complete blank on. she decides to approach her though, thinking that maybe talking to her will help jog her memory a bit] Was that something you managed to salvage from the ship?

scathach | the secrets of the immortal nicholas flamel

[symmachy]

ARRIVAL

[It's blue.

I hate blue.

Eyes that had been slits moments before widen with her first coherent thought. The tube that had already begun retracting into the machine is grabbed by a hand too small to carry the strength it truly does. The invading line is unceremoniously (and rather viciously) ripped from her throat. Were she not so dizzy, she might have torn it completely from the pod. As if in response, the machine ejects her with a flood of blue gunk. Her body slams wetly into the opposite wall, and Scathach grunts.

What in the actual fuck?

She is naked, wet, and feels bruised all over--but only one of those things truly concerns her. If skin could literally crawl, Scatty's would be fleeing her body right now. She hates anything even remotely related to water. The grunt is quickly followed by an inhuman hiss, the young woman pushing herself to her feet. She is dizzy, but millennia of self discipline keep her from giving up even the slightest wobble. Her short red hair, tinged purple by space gunk, sticks to her head and her jade eyes are wide and alert. Cat-slit irises and pupils scan the metal around her. It feels like there is iron everywhere.

That skin-crawling feeling is back again.

This cannot be. Sophie and Josh, Nicholas and Perenelle--they need her.

The redhead spits. Frustration mounts. Fists clench. Teeth bare, canines long and pointed.

The Shadow throws back her head and screams, a bloody, savage sound.]

EXPLORATION

[The makeshift blade isn't nearly as sharp as any of her beloved swords, but it serves its purpose just fine: vegetation falls with each swing of her arm, soon trampled beneath footfalls made heavy by boots. Scathach stares straight ahead, but her senses are open to all around her: the animal noises, the changes in the wind, the scent of nearby water. She thinks that particular source has already been discovered by something less savory than the humans here, so she turns her attention elsewhere.]

If we are to find our way out of this Shadowr--off this planet, we need to find out as much about it as we can.

[The words are not specifically addressed to her companion, but they leave the expectation of a response. Conversations with humani are not her forte, but if she's stuck here with a large group of them (who already know what she is, there was no helping that), she may as well try to be friendly. Nicholas had always told her she should meet more people, after all.]

Exploration!

[unconqueredson]

[Since the woman puts her improvised weapon to the vegetation, Saul keeps his own at his side, reluctant to waste its edge. Getting a good makeshift blade had not been easy, and he misses his hook-and-wire as he might an old friend, if he had any old friends. He has crept in her wake for some distance now, as they broke off from the other explorers that had left the camp. He had not given his name or spoke much at all, only showed his blade and said that he was thirsty and that he could keep up with her in the woods. So far the assertion had proven true. The lean, silent boy, maybe sixteen and alarming in the intensity of his hungry gaze, watches his companion's back without comment or complaint, and is swift to react to any unknown noise with ready steel.

The sound of water draws him, but he also knows better than to rush in. The jungle is considerably thicker than the more temperate woods that he is used to. He stands at alert listening for a moment, and wonders if he could call his storms here, in this heat.]

If we are to do anything at all we need to drink before we die, [he tells her flatly, unconcerned with the talk about planets and leaving them, which for him is plain nonsense.]

Predators come to river banks. Can you climb trees? [He is long out of the habit of coordinating efforts or paying attention to anyone else's survival, but he has followed her so far and two blades are usually better than one. At least if both are competent.]

diana meade - the secret circle

[mead]

ARRIVAL;

[ It’s terrifying. She doesn’t know where she is or what’s going on, just that’s she’s floating and naked with something jammed into her throat; it causes her to choke, and when the liquid drains and the tube is whipped out of her trachea, Diana falls to the floor, coughing. Goo comes out of her lungs and nose, and she registers that she’s cold but it’s second to how scared she is. Diana lays in the fetal position for what feels like an eternity, but it’s probably only a minute or two. She pushes herself up, first using her forearms and then her hands, looking around at her surroundings.

And terror turns into a sort of bemused awe.

She’s never seen anything like it before. She’s not the only one coming out of the tubes, and people are slowly making their way towards a hole not straight above them, but enough of a climb that Diana’s not even sure she’ll be able to make it at first. She follows suit eventually, struggling her way up the climb. The sun is blinding when she pulls herself up and over, collapsing on the edge. She takes a few ragged breaths, and pushes herself up again, staring at the trees surrounding them. ] Where am I?

BASE CAMP;

[ Being a witch, attunement with nature should come, well, naturally, but Diana’s never been big on camping. The ground isn’t comfortable, she doesn’t enjoy not having access to a shower, and the humidity is gross. She’s firmly decided she prefers the cold, rainy, humidity of Washington than the hot, sticky, humidity of-- wherever this is.

She doesn’t complain. For one, there’s no point, she’s not the only one who’s miserable. There’s very little anyone can do about it. For two, complaining would be wasting energy she could use for other things.

She’s got her hair piled up in a messy bun on the top of her head, tied with some string she’s managed to find. She’s taking a break, back resting on the wall of a nearby cabin. So far she hasn’t found anything around the base camp that she’s particularly good at aside from lighting fires with her magic, something that a few other people can do as well. She doesn’t like not staying busy. It keeps her mind from wandering to where she’s at and why she’s here, being miserable that she’s away from home, even if technically she doesn’t want to go back there. Earth counts as home, right? She fans herself with the hem of her shirt, heaving a sigh. Cooking had been a disaster, so she wasn’t going to try again. She didn’t really know how to use or repair weaponry, and flora and fauna were alien (of course) to her, so she wasn’t really any help identifying that. She was starting to feel like a useless burden, and she hated it.

Diana closes her eyes and rests her head against the wall, reaching up to rub at her forehead. There had to be something she could do to help out. Right? ]

delirium: the sandman

[inbetweens]

arrival.
[ she is floating and not floating because the ooey-gooey water is holding her up. gentle hands of a thousand fingers and she would laugh except the sound does not travel. sound wants to stay right where it is, in her breast and throat. have you ever wondered where sound lives? sound must have a home.

then she realizes that the door is locked and that's why sound can't travel! silly, silly. ooey-gooey is moving, though, being set free. bye bye. delirium is sad. the ooey-gooey held her up. it was her friend. quiet friend. they had naptime. everything is draining down, where does it go? she is right here, she thinks. she does not always know. she knows other things, things you do not know. she tries to tell you. sometimes. she does not know how.

everything hurts and she thinks it is from the loss of her friend, though she can no longer remember why she liked the friend. she is sticky. she is a jelly doughnut, full of filling. vitreous humor. that's what it's called.

eventually, she crawls up out of the little hole. (a hole, a hole! just like a doughnut.) she shouts. she is shouting red and blue and green and yellow, allowing the sound to move, watching the colors puff and fly and whirl. ]

Can you tell me where my friend is? Or who they are? Because I'm reeeeally messy, so I probably shouldn't see my friend without a bath, right?

exploration.
[ delirium lies flat on her back, gazing at the sky through the leaves. she makes up a number for each leaf. grenty-nope. ickloo. thile-quark. she needed to make up new numbers, you see, because there were so many.

she hears feet, and there are only two of those. two move over and over again. two feet, four steps, then eight. steps are growing. are the feet growing? she needs to know. she rolls onto her belly and waves at the figure. ]

How many feet do you have? I have two, most of the time, but one time, I had seven. A foot for me and my brothers and my sisters.