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ximilialog2023-06-01 06:40 pm
- ! event log,
- adventure time: finn mertens,
- adventure time: jake the dog,
- fear street: ziggy berman,
- grishaverse: the darkling,
- gundam seed/destiny: yzak jule,
- lockwood & co: anthony lockwood,
- pacific rim: newton geiszler,
- red vs blue: felix,
- star trek aos: james t. kirk,
- star trek aos: leonard mccoy,
- the old guard: andromache,
- yakuza: zhao tianyou
MISSION: THE AI AND THE COMMANDER
● ● ● M I S S I O N 1 4 . 0
The hum of the teleportation platform is familiar, filling your ears as the bright light dissipates enough to safely open your eyes. You feel something solid beneath your feet, and the lack of scent from the asphalt and dirt in Nuhiri and Deumia marks a departure from anything resembling a planet, the space around you giving you no reason to think anything of it. You're on the Ximilia once again — finally. Another mission successfully accomplished, for whatever other hardships you and the rest of the team have endured. Hot food and hot showers await, and Newt will surely be scurrying off to prepare for the team’s usual post-mission movie night.
You’re back and you can’t wait for Viveca to greet you, and for Degar to take the orb away, back to the North Wing to join the other ones.
Except … the station’s walls appear to be peeling, and some of the equipment looks a little older and unpolished. There’s even a layer of space-dust on one of the control boards. And most importantly: no one is here to greet you. As you turn and look to your fellow crewmates in confusion, even now some of you might start to wonder at the change of routine. Ivy, who had just been handling the orb, will be empty-handed, but surely there’s nothing to worry about. The station is peaceful and still. Nothing feels amiss … yet. And then:
The sound of 0-L1V-14 — or 'Olivia' as many have come to call her — voice springs to life around you. She almost seems to sound confused for a moment, clearly recalibrating her systems for this strange occurrence, before the gentle tenor of her voice regains its composure and she recalls her mission directive. The lights in the teleportation platform seem to glow just a little brighter, as though the arrival of the crew has buoyed the AI's spirits.
Well? You heard the AI. Best to start looking.
1.0 The first thing you might think to do is return to the sleeping quarters, either to clean up and change into another set of clothes; or to take a much-deserved nap; or maybe you just need a moment to yourself to collect your thoughts. The doors to the sleeping quarters seem to stick for a moment, which isn’t worrying in and of itself, but as the doors slide open you realize that you’re looking into a dark and empty carved out space that resembles a place for storage more than anything else. The walls and doors that used to make up your individual rooms are absent, and the floors are stripped bare, with rows of perforated grates allowing the cavernous space to remain relatively well-ventilated. It’s clear that no one has visited this room in quite some time, and perhaps there had once been plans for it, now abandoned to hold a stock of random items in its place.
There are boxes stacked against the wall, and a shelving unit that holds miscellaneous supplies: cans and boxes, batteries and wires, old bound notebooks made of paper. Rolls of rough tarp are haphazardly leaning against the wall to one corner, and thermal blankets are scattered amongst scraps of loose-leaf, a sketch of a cluster of spherical shapes in different colours, and other foreign knick-knacks that seem to have no place on a space station. If you decide to explore this space you’ll have to provide your own source of light as none of the lighting above seem to work though the row of fixtures that you’re used to seem, at least, to have been installed. They’re just not currently online.
Investigating the room a little deeper might draw you to a simple metal box sitting in the middle shelf next to what looks like a half-broken lute, its strings missing. There is no lock on this box, as though it wants to be opened, and lifting the lid will reveal a bright rosy-coloured light. Reaching out towards the small sliver of light in the shape of an elongated teardrop will recall a memory of your childhood so vivid, you’ll think you were back in that time, in that exact moment, to relive it again. Whether it's a good memory or a tragic one is left up to random chance. Only someone entering the room to talk you through your memory will remind you that you aren’t actually a child any longer.
2.0 Perhaps you decide to forgo the sleeping quarters entirely, and want to revisit one of your favourite simulations in the simulation room. Familiar oceans, the futuristic bar, or the room filled with adorable puppies might be your first choice — but every preset you’re used to scrolling through seems to be different now. There are the standard, familiar pre-mission training simulations, and even the Lodgen Mountain Mines mission appears to be here, but everything else has either been deleted … or it was never here to begin with.
You might decide to go ahead with one of the already existing simulations anyway, or you might want to start rewriting the one you’d come here for in the first place. It will depend on your luck, and it will depend on the success of your mission-training, but a small shard of bright, silvery coloured light may suddenly reveal itself to you. It appears like a thin tear-shape that hangs suspended in the air. The faintest whisper beckons you close; it’s familiar. Will you reach out to touch it? Doing so will colour the simulation room around you with a memory so real it might as well be — suddenly you might recall a happy moment in your life, or perhaps your greatest victory or adventure. This can be shared with whoever enters the simulation room with you or after you, and will fade when you manage to locate the right door and leave the room.
3.0 The sunlight room that you may have walked through on countless occasions is missing the familiar bridge, the river that runs beneath it, and trees that surround it. Instead, the vegetation around you appears to be far more deliberate and practical, thick foliage like bushes planted in rows, their large leaves covering most of the ground and soil. Several small metal boxes with wires and buttons can be found planted across the space, each with a thin rotating disc that whirs and spins quietly. Each of these boxes appears to give off readings, each screen displaying a continuous green wavy line scrolling across it and text that displays the quality of the air with a percentile grade, the amount of it being produced, and that particular box’s designation zone: Mess Hall, Storage, Living Quarters, and Teleportation Platform among others. This isn’t just a room that simulates nature, but if you were to approach any of the small bushes and saplings here, it’s clear that the plants here are real and they’re currently working to provide the rest of the station with oxygen.
Further to the back of the sunlight room, a bright sliver of colourful green light seems to glitter and glint between the leaves. It feels familiar in the way that it whispers faintly, and if you concentrate you can make out the sound of your name in a voice like that of someone from your past: a friend, perhaps, or a family member. Maybe a loved one or an enemy. Or perhaps it’s a voice you can’t actually recognize. It might compel you to reach out for the light, but will you listen? Or will you turn away?
If you embrace the light and call out in answer to the voice, you will re-experience the action, the conversation, or the thought that you attribute as being the reason you are who you are today with that most important person being the key piece in your memory.
4.0 Looking for your usual snacks? Feeling peckish for that bowl of instant spicy space-ramen you saved for post-mission? You might head into the kitchen expecting the familiar foodstuffs that you’re used to only to find that the room has been rearranged, with far fewer cupboards and appliances, and more of what looks like typical space-fare: freeze-fried items and nutrition-focused meals sealed into silver foiled bags. What ‘fresh’ ingredients exist are even less, and there are a stack of dirty plates and cutlery in the sink that don’t look like anything you or your crewmates might have used. You may already suspect that this whole station isn’t the one you’re used to, or you might still be in denial. Either way, you may find through your rummaging the call to a little sliver of coppery-coloured light located behind the freezer door.
If you decide to touch the fragment of light here, you’ll feel a ghostly burning as though the glint of the light has cut your skin, almost cold enough to feel sharp — but it’s just your imagination, isn’t it? What you remember now as it comes back to life around you (and the team member or members who may have joined you) is the best meal you’ve ever eaten, whether it is something you made for yourself, something made by your loved one, or the meal that leaves your heart feeling empty and aching.
5.0 You may have become so accustomed to seeing the North Wing doors sealed that it’s your curiosity that draws you forward to the wide expanse beyond the now open wing, your feet testing the threshold as if you’re expecting an invisible wall to keep you out. Nothing happens when you step into the North Wing, though you might immediately notice the large tank that holds all of the team’s successfully captured orbs is very clearly missing. And not only that but the space appears to be well lived in, a small cluster of worn chairs and a table set to one side, and data pads and drawings on white-boards in plain view. They don’t seem to be much more than a couple of crude strategy diagrams (and a couple of silly stick figures in one corner) and as you move towards the crew quarters, some of you might instantly recognize the familiar room with its rows of beds and a scattering of personal effects assigned to each bunk. Photos are pinned to walls of a twenty-person crew, pillows and blankets are left in disarray by unfinished knitting projects, a diary written in a language you can’t quite translate, and a stuffed elephant-shaped plush doll lies at the head of one of the beds in the middle of the room. By the door is a neatly made bed. An analogue paperback novel sits on the nightstand, a bookmark set in the middle to note its progress. On top of it is a well-kept watch stopped a little after the sixth hour and a medal of service in the now recognizable insignia of the Ndiera Complex’s Federation.
By the far wall of these sleeping quarters is a bright golden starlight that seems to illuminate that side of the room as though someone had turned on a torchlight to the highest setting; it’s almost blinding. Moving closer to it, you’ll find that it’s like all the other slivers of light scattered across the station — a broken shard, like a piece of a large puzzle. Touching it may pull you — and whoever might be in the room with you — into a memory from your time with the Ximilia crew, whether it happened over a year ago, or it happened only on the last mission. It might be a happy memory, or it might be something you regret, which is poignant considering your initial raison d’etre for being here at all. It’s a vision that appears from your perspective and while you relive it, you feel outside of yourself.
6.0 The rest of the station still appears to be intact, with the infirmary, the training room, and the armoury in the same locations that you remember. Those of you who have been here for quite some time, you’ll find your way around by muscle memory alone; but even if you’re a newer member of the crew you’ll have wandered the halls enough to know what feels familiar to you … and what doesn’t.
The infirmary looks to be a little out of date, though it looks as if it’s seen its fair share of use. And it’s smaller too, the more recent addition and surgical area missing from the cozy space. The training room and the armoury share similar qualities of seeming a little older, a little more lived in, and with well-used equipment and weapons to boot. The training room is still padded with firm padded flooring and benches for sitting. Some of the racks and hooks (all empty) that had been against the wall have fallen now, and similar to the teleportation room, you’ll find that some of the paneling in this room has since peeled away, revealing some of the bare structure behind them. In the armoury, you won’t find your favourite knife or preferred staff but there are still a few choices in weaponry to arm yourself with.
Wherever you decide to explore, you might once more happen upon a bright bluish light that seems to whisper and call to you in soft, hushed tones. No specific words can be picked out through the murmurs but the feeling is all the same — it draws you forward like a moth to flame, but whether you decide to reach a hand out to touch the sliver of light that hangs suspended in the air is entirely your choice. If you do, you might succumb to a vivid memory of a significant injury you or someone important to you had suffered once, reliving that moment with too sharp clarity. Those feelings of fear or threat or maybe even satisfaction seem to come to you again as though you were there again — only this time you may not be alone as you witness this memory, and someone else has entered the room with you.
● ● ●
Present Day.
The teleportation platform hums quietly in a clean, well-maintained room. No walls or floors appear to be even the least bit dented, and now the Commander of the Ximilia stands behind the control board, staring at the screen as though doing so will bring their crew back by some wild form of magic. Degar knows magic — he’d come from a world so full of it. This, however, is something different.
Beside him, Viveca scans through the data that had sent the crew into the Ndiera Complex, as it should have brought them back the same way, with the orb in tow.
The Commander and the AI both turn their gaze towards the still empty teleportation platform before exchanging worried glances with each other. Degar finally heaves an exhale but the frown in his features deepens.
Viveca nods, her voice sounding complicated when she responds next.
F Y I
• For this mission, we have decided to run the search request mechanic a little differently. Depending on whether your character decides to touch or grasp one or any of the slivers of coloured light that can be found throughout the station, you will have the opportunity to participate in a search request. More on this is explained HERE.
• If you have questions about any of the prompts or the mission in general, please direct them HERE.
• Any in-character questions to 0-L1V-14 can be asked HERE.
• And finally, your soundtrack for this log: ♪ ♪ ♪
yes pls you are always free w/ liberties!! go ham i'm chill
the dark swing of hair curtaining over one shoulder announces her, first, peeking out for a flash of a glimpse. when she fully emerges around the corner, it's with the same caution of animal peeking around its den, assuring itself there's no snapping teeth awaiting them just outside the boundaries of safety.
because that's what this is, in truth. the towering shelves radiate a sense of peaceful comfort that bleeds with familiarity. they nearly seem larger than life, in presence alone if not size — labyrinthine, meant for losing herself within. isolated, moreso. carrying loneliness, for all that it's designed to seal her away.
she plucks a tome from its nearby resting place, curled within her arms as a shield. curious, her eyes sweep over him. there's nothing identifiable about this man — itachi. no kefta. no colorful threads spun through his clothing that might allow her a hint of his identity. that might explain the strange recognition that clouds over her like deja vu.
it'd be insanity to claim she'd seen him in a dream once. it's more insane to realize it wouldn't be so outlandish, with all that her sleep contains lately. he has that look about him, surely — like a figment pulled from a waking dream. phantom-like, in her remembrance of him, down to the billowing shadow of his sleeves.
her brows crease. ]
You shouldn't be wearing that. [ it's certainly ... a fashion statement. and almost a provocation, really, to wear what's blacker than black in the home of the black general. she snorts, a burst of impertinence that temporarily cleaves through her uncertainty. ] That's his color.
okay! <3
Is it, now?
（ he has come to favour blue, aboard the ximilia. that rich, deep colour so associated with the uchiha, like the blush of a midnight sky lit by a ribbon of cobalt aurora. but he is not terribly surprised to find himself in black, something that mirrors the robes of the akatsuki. he cannot say if it is more a statement on how alina sees him, or how he sees himself.
one corner of his mouth quirks upwards in a sort of wry irony. then: ）
I suppose he will have to forgive me my trespasses, then.
time is an illusion etc etc i'm sorry for my continued slow fugue state
Good luck with that.
[ she realizes the delay between her brain and her mouth too late. some modicum of contriteness shadows her face. not apologetic, no — but the expression of one whose come to expect a firm rap to the knuckles, or far worse, for speaking out of line. a duck of her head hangs a dark shroud of hair over her face, retreating behind a curtain. keen to hide, by old habit.
it will undoubtedly find its way into kirigan's ear. the little palace hardly seems to creak without him knowing. and falling out of his favor — alina doesn't want to process why it gnaws at her. she sweeps back toward the towering shelf, instead, with nearly inaudible steps. just the click, click of a heel that gives away her efforts to exist like a spirit, unseen and unheard, among these books.
when her eyes glimpse itachi's way, it's only small peeks. bursts of a girl who hasn't mastered the art of subtlety, yet. a point made even more obvious when she blurts out, ]
What business does a non-Grisha have in the Little Palace, anyway?
no subject
something twists, an old familiar ache in his chest.
when she peeks towards him, he pretends not to notice. instead, he busies himself in running a finger along the spines of the books. his fingers come away dusted with gold leaf — a curiously intricate detail for a dream.
what business does he have indeed? a man that looks like the enemies of this place, vested in the colour of the black general. it would be audacious beyond reproach. with his back to her, now — ）
I am not in the Little Palace.
（ perhaps that is just a little enigmatic, and after a moment he clarifies: ）
My name is Itachi.
no subject
That doesn't sound like a Ravkan name.
[ a question weaves through the tapestry of that statement — just a single thread, waiting for him to tug it, before alina gives it permission to unspool. it isn't that itachi doesn't resemble any ordinary ravkan name; it's alina's immediate hyper-awareness that it can't be, with her keen attention to what ravka would consider otherness.
the way that she is set apart as half-shu, a misfit even among misfits. the way that botkin has had to earn respect. the way alina had wanted to gravitate toward him, accordingly. it's no different with itachi, here and now, a certain curiosity coloring her gaze. an inquisitiveness that nearly borders on desperate, in her tendency to stretch toward a connection between herself and any person that might do more than simply tolerate her.
someone that might understand her, to some degree. ( that wide yearning that had been too easy to lose and immerse herself within, with the darkling's encouragement; that craving that had made her too susceptible. )
she stares for a moment longer, before she seems to shake off the rudeness of it. wipes her hands down the front of her kefka, as though it might ease her balmy palms. ]
Who are you, really?
[ not in name, but — in design. if not grisha or kirigan's acquaintance, then — friend? foe? her gut instinct whispers neither, a sense she stamps down. ]
no subject
his ready response is married, stitch by stitch, to a past he has begun to feel he is outgrowing. a criminal and a terrorist. it seems oddly foolish to cling to it. to insist upon it. not when it was a choice he never truly made for himself — just a mold he was obliged to occupy at the behest of another. he had spoken to her once of danzō, less the name. but petty men with some small power and a sense of conviction about the justification of their own cruelties always follow certain leylines, don't they? what is true of aleksander is true of felix is true of danzō, and has been true of him in the past. tiring of the toil does not erase what he has done.
but — who he is now, who he has chanced to become is beyond the sum of what he was made. but conveyance of that fact is difficult, mired in a world beyond his awareness. her world. a library created with such perfect, loving detail that marks it as a place of sanctuary and escape for whomsoever she chanced to be within the walls of the little palace. did she come here often, to catch her breath? to step away from the busy, palatial life? serenity found in the eye of a storm.
he looks down at his hand, poised neatly to pull a new book from a shelf. even in dreaming, now, the akatsuki ring is gone. he exhales. drops his hand away. turns to face her again, his expression set and somber, the rich red of the sharingan a faint glimmer — the way light pours through stained glass. ）
It isn't. （ ravkan, he means. ） I am from a place called Konoha, and I do not believe I have an answer that can satisfy you. （ his expression shifts, becomes something faintly amused in a sort of self-flagellatory way. ） I am still learning that myself.
no subject
idly, her thumb dances over the curving slant of a tome, jagged at its edge. self-soothing, as she considers the implications of his words. me too, she does not share. for how open she is, as easily read as any of the books on this shelf, there is a part of her still prone to withholding. still braced for judgment. itachi may or may not have the luxury of finding himself, without outside forces pushing him along; a saint with no love for the title and prestige has already had a place carved out for her in this world, and rejecting that is ...
they've made her quite aware it isn't much of a possibility.
( what is there to learn about herself, besides, if everyone already seems so confident in their version of her? )
her lips press together, blanching with the force of what she does not admit. even the swelling breath in her cheeks is telling of that fact. but what she settles on is a cynical little, ]
Well, you had best figure it out. [ a breath billows out of her. empties the roundness of her face. ] Before someone else figures it out for you.
[ it's projection, no doubt. they've made the same efforts with her, this malleable thing they're trying to shape like clay, as if sun summoners can be made once you apply the right (grueling) pressure. ]
cw: battle-related imagery/death
Forgive me. People do not usually speak to me so bluntly.
（ but he is clearly delighted she chose to.
one does not forget being feared so easily.
his expression softens, and he gives her a polite bow in the custom of his people, arms at his sides. ）
I appreciate your concern, but I am on the other side of that battle.
（ something slips in, then. for a moment they are not standing within her memory but his — an empty field, with bodies all around them. crow feast on corpses, the cacophony of their sounds a dizzying, deafening shriek amplified by the hundreds, and there is a small child barely out of toddlerhood observing them with an expression that might look neutral if not for the tears. but it is only a brief schism, a flash like lightning and gone as quickly as lightning is. ）
I have made my peace with what was asked of me, and what I became. （ he is not ready to speak the words forgiveness. but he circles it like a wary creature at the edge of firelight. he will always hate who he has been, but perhaps he does not need to be so quick condemn the man he could become. ） However, I am ready to be something else.
no subject
You —
[ you, what? that shrill cacophony of that flock lingers, like a phantom echo down a hallway. she almost can't hear herself over the din of noise ringing in her ears. over the roaring rush of blood. it's not quite fear, but it lingers at that boundary. maybe she's gone mad. maybe these bursts of clarity are just her own body stirring somewhere in bed, waiting to jump awake from some awful dream. and she'll go on with her day as she has, of late, pretending away the oddly prophetic haze around her own nightmares.
this doesn't feel like that. no, that isn't right. it feels like that, only — like a prophecy has already come and gone. not an omen, but like she's been shown a flash of something too late for her to understand its meaning. if she were more susceptible to superstition, she might even believe herself haunted. an absurd thought, she assures herself, through the rattled shake of her head. ]
Have you? [ after a staggered moment, she clarifies, ] Made your peace.
[ dubiousness bleeds through. there is no end, it seems, to her thoughtless manner of being blunt. it's quite nearly a child's manners, ignoring tact in favor of asking endless questions to soothe their own curiosities. an emphasis, perhaps, on how unworldly she is. ( had been. ) ]
From where I'm standing, you have the look of a restless spirit.
[ it's the crimson sheen in his gaze, perhaps, if not the darkness encasing a shared glimpse of a life not her own. as though he were an apparition, showing her his final moments before that boy been killed to become — whatever he had become, that day. how can anyone possibly be at peace with that? ]
no subject
Yes.
（ that he has found peace, or made it. truthfully, the first glimmer of it was felt on cirawei, standing beneath the stars of a dying world. it came from knowing they had worked together, done everything they could to save them. since then, it has shifted and settled into something less ephemeral.
even if he cannot change his regret — ）
But I can understand why you might think otherwise.
（ restless, she calls him — and perhaps he seems so. while his behaviour and attitude is hardly out of place in the shinobi world, he has been long enough aboard the ximilia now to know that what most take as calm assurance in his home others take as either arrogance or evidence of injury here. why not also a restless spirit? he knows little of alina's home, save what has been gleaned from mal and kirigan.
he cocks his head faintly to one side, and in a moment of naked honesty — ）
It feels selfish of me to say so.
（ to lay claim to a province of anything but shame and guilt and self-hatred. even love became a thing twisted along the path of his life. ）
sorry for the continued slow, family health + computer issues on top of it hit me something fierce.
[ a memory nags at her awareness, just an embedded shard. she'd known someone like that once, she thinks, a time ago. perhaps not so long ago at all. she can't parse the sensation; trying to parse it is like trying to retell a dream that's become blurrier, the longer she's awake. her brows furrow, as if pained by her attempts to extract the solid details of a haunted face and sad eyes.
her eyes drift to itachi, wondering if she might find the same lamenting glimmer reflected in his stare. in the end, it doesn't seem she has the courage to demand nor hold his eyes; uncertainty marks the way her gaze slides back to the books in front of her, undecided as to whether her attention would be welcome.
would she want eyes on her, if she were peeling back her skin to reveal something so honest about her insides? unlikely. she pays him the same privacy, even as her mouth flips into a considering frown. ]
Is that it?