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ximilialog2024-02-04 12:58 pm
MISSION: A WASTE TO LIVE, PART 2
● ● ● M I S S I O N 1 8 . 2
Several weeks pass. And as surely as the frigid cold follows the sweltering heat on the Plains, one day will follow another. In their passing, orbers will find themselves wiser to everything that surrounds them, including the tragic history of Go’ama, the countless dead, the cities in ruins, and all that now make up the desert outside of the one city still standing.
As day follows night and night follows day, one thing is certain for those living on the Roof: its walls, constructed from limestone, will keep out those exiled from the city, dooming them to a slow and agonizing death. And yet in the morning, the orbers in the city who have been able to feel the suppression of the limestone, and the way it has radiated a feeling of pure nothingness, taking away their powers — if only momentarily ... that feeling is suddenly gone. It doesn't happen everywhere — the limestone inside the city still feels the same, whether in unrefined batches or in the handcuffs and bars of the prison cells, but one thing is undeniable: the city walls, once able to keep out any creature of magic, human or not, will no longer do so.
For those orbers stuck in the city, it means that leaving now will be as easy as walking past the walls and into the endless desert, the sand-filled air burning your throat as it crunches beneath your feet like dry and brittle bone. As for those out on the Plains — the walls of the city have crumbled to nothing — at least metaphorically. Now nothing keeps you in ... and nothing keeps you out.
Under the scorching brightness of the sun, beaten by the dry heat, the command to move is finally given; groups of exiled Go’amans and rebels alike make their way towards the gates that lead into the Roof. A familiar sight to many of the orbers by now, the tall, haphazard structures overlaid over centuries of destroyed ruins relays a long-standing history of people clawing their way past the wreckage in the hopes of doing little more than surviving another day. It is the perfect culmination of chaos and suffering that attracts the objects of power that the Ximilia team seeks for (hopefully) the last time ... of course the orbs have other ideas in mind.
1.0 There’s no forewarning before your mind, once clear and focused on the task at hand, suddenly fills with strange visions that become more and more twisted, the more worked up you become. Nightmares of losing your sense of self, your mind, your will-power warp with hallucinations of turning against everyone you know and adore. Your closest friends, your partner, the people who are and have become your family, they turn to you with pleading faces. Some of them lie motionless at your feet; some are no longer breathing. You feel as though you have always been a traitor. You are the monster. You aren’t yourself anymore. You never were. It feels so real — and you suddenly feel cold despite the heat as a chorus of whispering voices inside your head remind you of this mantra, over and over again. Behind it all is an echo of self-satisfied laughter, of a presence patiently watching you unravel.
2.0 If you manage to survive the onslaught of hallucinations and nightmarish visions that still leave a cold sheen of sweat along your skin, the back of your neck still prickling, you might now emerge from the haze feeling as though every atom in your body has shifted just a little. Like fog dissipating, your mind clears. And for those of you with existing powers, you realize that the innate ability that comes to you instinctually is now suddenly alien. Or perhaps it’s something even worse: you feel empty. In the vast wasteland that is the Plains, where survival may be a daily test of endurance and sheer will-power, at least you and your fellow exiled are free to use your abilities. But when those abilities suddenly stop working, or when they work differently, you realize that surviving out here just got a whole lot more complicated. Stranger still, this power might not belong to you, but it’s immediately familiar because you’ve seen this before … your teammate used this once on a previous mission, and now that power appears to be yours. Whether you’ve always known having a power, or you’ve suddenly acquired one after being without any kind of metaphysical ability all of your life, it will take some adjusting to — and there isn’t much time.
3.0 The upper council residing on the Roof feel it: the walls that have kept this city safe and shielded its populace from the unknown terrors of the Plains have come undone. The people feel it too, in some ways. Like a small exhale that ripples across the city, it’s as if a clenched fist has released its grip on the Roof. It won’t be felt by all, but those with powers might feel a little more at ease. Orbers that currently dwell within the dilapidated structures of the Roof will not only notice this change, but other changes within themselves too. Like your fellow teammates out in the Plains, those with powers might find that you can’t tap into those familiar abilities, either swapped out for something else entirely, or perhaps nothing at all. And like your teammates in the Plains, if you’ve never had metaphysical abilities before and have suddenly acquired one, you’ll have to catch up quickly, because time is running short.
The tension within the city feels heightened as the clans prepare for the inevitable chaos to come now that the limestone’s effects have mysteriously stopped, and above it all, positioned at the parapet of one of the highest rooftops, the leader of the Vo’a Mahdin stands solitary, her face obscured by her mask. From her vantage point she can make out the solid dark spire that stands in the distance of the Plains. But it isn’t the Tower that she studies now. She tips her head slightly to look up into the sky, towards the brightly burning sun that bathes all under its light. And then she pulls away. After all, she, too, has work to do.
Out on the Plains the Tower stands still, its obsidian walls stretching towards the skies, quiet and imposing. And yet there is still a way in: by providing important names from history, those of the people who had once worked with Rehil Hahn himself, and those who then worked to preserve something, anything, of the world that was left behind. These names are given to ensure the tragedy that their once-friend had instigated would never happen again.
The group headed for the Tower is a large one, consisting of both orbers who had already been on the Plains, but also reinforcements from those in the city — and finally, two of the locals: Manaia of the Dai’a Svar, and Ahkbarl, a now-reformed thug.
Jaima Bryn. Gawen Klass. Havila Maas. Kal Chomai.
Four names are spoken into the scorching air. And a doorway, as if drawn onto the side of the Tower, opens with a creak.
There’s nothing more to do now but enter.
4.0 The stairs seem to stretch on forever. You climb and climb, one foot in front of the other, until your knees are aching and your thighs begin to scream in protest, your lungs heaving with the need to gulp in breaths of air that they can't find. But if you decide to stop, perhaps to pause and sit or simply lean your hands against your knees and catch a gasp of oxygen — you begin to feel your feet sinking into the stairs as if they'd suddenly turned into liquid mud. Your ankle first, and then the other. And the more tired you are when you stop, the deeper you sink, and the harder it becomes to pull out again. And unlike quicksand, these strange stairs seem to sap you of your energy once they have caught you too.
The only way to not get caught? It's to keep going. Risk staying behind to help your friends and you might find your own feet swallowed into the treads until you are chest-deep in a viscous substance, a voice whispering all of your failures into your ears.
You deserve to stay here, it croons an echo inside your mind. Think of everyone you’ve failed. Everyone who has ever loved you … trusted you. You’ve failed them, and you’ve failed here too. Who would forgive you? Who would care about you? Everyone will leave you behind. And isn’t that better? If they don’t, you’ll doom them to die here. Alone, desperate. Just let go.
And maybe you do. But perhaps you don’t. Whatever the case, you’ll need some help getting out if you want to live.
5.0 Finally, the last of the stairs leads you to a door that you slam open without even pausing, before the stairs starts to suffocate you. You stagger into a room resembling an antechamber; it's empty except for one table that occupies the middle: and on it is a dark purple jewel exuding a sickly glow around it, pulsing lightly.
You exhale and take a step towards it.
But a voice — the voice, the same echo from the stairs — roots you in your place.
You will hear me, it whispers gently, with the tenderness of a lover. You find the whisper comforting and intimate, a warmth spreading through you for simply hearing it. Despite your better judgment, you strain your ears, eager for more.
You’ve done so well to come to me. I am the only one that can help you. Just me. The others … they’ll never understand. But I do. I see inside you, all you’ve been through, and you’ve suffered so much. You feel the prick of tears begin to fill your eyes. No one has ever understood you like this; you feel seen. Slowly you feel a sliver of something slide into your mind, something that wasn’t there before, like a hand reaching into you and rearranging something in you.
Good, good. And now ... you will forget.
It takes you too long before you can question such a declaration. Forget what? you think. Did something happen? Did — Confusion fills your mind. What are you supposed to forget?
You might begin to mouth, “Who are you?” Your throat will strain and sting. Weird. You haven’t been screaming … right?
I am patience, comes the answer. I am misery.
And it's as if those words suddenly unleash something, you feel it then: that feeling is pain. A cut on your cheek, the fracture of a bone, a punch to your gut: slowly, the injuries you have previously suffered are inflicted on you anew — but it turns out it's not only the injuries you yourself have received. You'll notice that the pain also comes from any injuries you remember inflicting on others in your past, whether that had been a day ago, a week ago or years ago.
You'll scream. And all around you in that seemingly empty room, others scream too.
6.0 You realize it now: this room has never been empty. Others have made it inside before you, but you couldn't see them, and they couldn't see you. But now you see them, meeting the eyes of a friend, or a teammate — and now more than ever you know you have to help each other. Move now, and drag yourself through the agony of your feet shuffling across the floor. Push through the pain to make it to your friend. You have to reach out and touch them —
But when you do, all you can hear now is their trembling voice, babbling in fear and speaking aloud everything that they are afraid of. Except when you study them, their mouth isn’t moving, which means it's the physical contact between you allowing you to hear them — and you can’t help them without touching them, can you? Because the contact appears to drown out your own pain, giving you a moment of clarity — or perhaps you are simply stronger together. You will need to keep in close proximity (via physical touch) to your teammates and decide between your worst fears being heard or continuing to endure the pain from all those injuries.
You have to stop it. Stop all of it, once and for all. Slowly you turn to the orb and try to drag yourself towards it — but as soon as your hand reaches out for it, a woman stumbles into the room from the door at the back.
Behind you, you see the door open again, this time letting in Manaia, who doesn’t freeze immediately upon hearing the orb’s whispers. Instead she looks at the orb and then at Kal Chomai. And she smiles.
Three things happen all at once: the orb glows brighter; an echo of laughter fills the room; and Kal Chomai lunges for it, panic blowing her eyes wide before she turns on her heels and disappears.
And someone, lightning-fast, catches her arm, disappearing with her.
Inside the cool caves of the Dai’a Svar hideout, Garam listens to Shinn’s explanation with remarkable calm. The truth of it all spills out: of Rehil Hahn, of the deal that he made, and of what the spark is capable of. And with that information out in the open, even when the situation is obviously a bad one … there’s no need for an attack is there? There’s no way the Dai’a Svar want to hurt the planet itself, right? To drain it of all life?
Garam listens.
And then he smiles.
With the last word of his riveting speech, golden strings whirl to life around the leader of the Dai’a Svar again. And like a sharp whip, they grab onto Shinn, easily flicking him across the room to land on the floor, knocked unconscious … at least long enough for Garam to marshal the forces of all of the spark users he has under his command.
And then hidden by the sandstorm, the Soldiers of the Spark march for war.
Bolstered now by the relentless determination and spirit of their leader, the Dai’a Svar move through blowing sands, shrouded from view, their hearts full of hope for a new future and their hands ready to fight — even kill for it. Some bear weapons: crude blades and pointed spears, sharpened by the spare resources around them — or through the Spark itself. Many rely on the Spark, having honed their skill to needlepoint precision the way an artist would tend to their craft. They steer forward as one, with Garam at the helm, not a soldier out of line nor abandoned in the fray.
7.0 If you are within the walls of the Roof, you and others around you might begin to notice the way the clans have begun to amass their strongest people, moving them towards the edges of the city. If questioned, these men, women and others alike will shrug in nonchalance or provide no response — but the answer becomes clear soon enough when tens of hundreds of dark specks begin to make themselves known through the shrouded sands as they step past the winds, their leader shouting commands from below. Suddenly it becomes clear that the clans within the Roof will need more people to defend their city — and they urge you to join along with them, strong as you may appear.
“Get ready for it,” one of the men beside you mutters under their breath. “This will not be easy. The starved do not have anything to lose, and these people … they have been wasting away to bones for hundreds of years.”
And then the Dai’a Svar begin to scale the walls.
8.0 Against the allied clans in the city, it would seem that the Dai’a Svar are no match — however, with their grit and the use of the Spark, they manage to infiltrate the useless limestone barricade, picking at it brick by futile brick, until it crumbles into debris and allows them through. Blasts of magic send up sparks of light and gusts of forceful energy, toppling gathered clanspeople from the Vo’a Mahdin, Sen Reuma, and Gal Masen Dai tribes as if they were nothing more than mere flies hovering over too-sweet wine. Against those who have suppressed the Spark, or who have never had it, the Dai’a Svar are at an advantage but they can fight — and they do. People from the Roof and the Plains alike fall as the attack continues on.
Whether you were here as part of the Roof, or you entered into the city from the Plains, you have the choice to fight for your side, against your side, or find some shelter to wait the battle out. Perhaps you’ll want to help the wounded, or simply make use of your abilities — whether they are borrowed from a fellow teammate or not. And of course, you might use this opportunity to seek your teammates out from the opposite side. This will not be a quick fight, but it does set up the perfect distraction for your true mission at hand.
9.0 Climb towards the highest point in the Roof onto the level they call 'the dome' and you begin to get a better sense of the fight happening further down, surrounded by broken statues and crumbled stone and structure: artifacts of a brutal history. You may also notice that the chief of the Vo’a Mahdin, Jial Bryn, and some of the other members from the Sen Reuma and Gal Masen Dai clans have gathered together, the latter clan members listening raptly.
Jial Bryn splits her attention between people around her before she finally turns towards you. You get the sense that you may have interrupted some important meeting but if it seems to bother her, she doesn't show it. Her face is still covered by her mask and the impassive, frozen features carved into the face pause in your direction before she lifts a hand, directing you to join her. Whether you’re from the Roof or the Plains seems to matter very little to her. In fact she doesn’t even seem to pay particular mind to her own clans-people as they begin to disperse with their given orders. Now, it seems, all she cares about is you.
“Come,” is all she says, and while her voice sounds a little odd, you may feel compelled to obey. She doesn’t wait to see whether you follow her as she heads into one of the topmost buildings, but she seems confident enough that you’ll be right behind her.
“I know what it is you seek,” she continues. “And I can help you get it. But the question is … are you worthy of it? Can you handle this power? After all, I’ve already seen what it can do to a weaker mind, a weaker people.”
Even if you try to leave now, you’ll find that every wall has become solid, any entry or exit is sealed, and when you turn back to look at the leader of the Vo’a Mahdin, her mask has been pulled away to reveal glistening black eyes and dark veins that form fissures across the milky-white skin of her face. Her eyes, like dark inkwells, bore into yours and suddenly images of your own failures, your losses, your grief are reflected in them. They pierce into the deepest parts of you, something sharp and hollow and painful, draining you of every happy thought you’ve ever had. You remember the bright and burning sun in Amaryllis Grove watching over an entire community, and you remember how the great eye slipped away from you … and you see the fallen bodies of those people you failed to save.
And like your teammates trapped within the Tower, you hear the whispers all around you and within you, channeling your own innermost doubts and fears and giving them voice. It feels hopeless to claw your way past them, they’re so loud — you’ll need help in order to go on, before Jial Bryn can pull you in and finish you.
F Y I
• If you have questions about any of the prompts or the mission in general, please direct them HERE.
• If your character is affected by either of the orbs in prompts 5.0 or 9.0, please let the mods know HERE. This knowledge will be important later on.
• And finally, your soundtrack for this log: ♪ ♪ ♪
QUESTIONS.
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ORB INFLUENCE.
What exactly the orbs do to the affected will be revealed later on. However, please note that signing up for this could possibly include playing out the following: psychological torture, mind-altered states. Note that this condition will not be permanent, though the duration of which will depend on how the unaffected characters decide to address the issue.
Ziggy @ The Tower
Newton Geiszler @ The Tower
Phoenix @ The Tower
Sherlock Holmes @ The Tower
Yzak @ the TOWER PARTY IG
anakin @ the roof
Aleksander @ the City / the dome
yujin @ the tower
Daisy Johnson @ The Roof
Natasha @ the tower
clarke griffin @ the tower
Ryunosuke @ the tower
andy @ the tower
NPC THREAD — KAL CHOMAI (closed to KOVACS @kovach)
Her eyes, when she finally looks at Kovacs, look like they can't quite decide what colour to be — brown, gold, with flecks of purple scattered throughout. She stares at him like a spooked animal.
The orb pulses in her hand.
"You shouldn't have done that," she says, voice wavering. "You shouldn't be here. It's not safe. No one is safe."
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It's been over two years since Takeshi Kovacs gave up everything to the orbs. His battle with them had started before he'd even realized just how entangled his life would become with their existence, mainly because altering his regret with them had caused him to nearly forget his choice to do so in the first place (the price for making deals, for trying to play with life and death, though he should've already known; no one has the right to play God after all, not any single one of them and especially not the orbs) — until trying to right his wrongs had resulted in the birth of a monster still dwelling underneath his skin even now.
The Patchwork Man has mostly remained silent since his transformation into that ferocious, unforgiving creature over a year ago, something he'd managed by maintaining a sense of calm in his mind and body. Ironic that a man made for war, even equipped now with a body customized to fight, could manage any kind of serenity to keep a beast at bay. Even more ironic that for all that he's boasted that peace is nothing but an illusion, that instinct of violence curls inside humanity like a parasite, proven over the course of every mission prowling with the very chaos the orbs feed upon, that he could find the possibility of tranquility.
But everything is temporary.
You are the monster. You aren’t yourself anymore. You never were. The nightmares surge back like a poison, feral cries of restless ghosts and old wars working their way back into his head, prodding at the demon within. The orbs are closer, and he can imagine they're, no doubt, weakening his defenses against that curse only barely resting inside of himself. But the end is near, too, which means he just has to hold on long enough to finish this. Finish the mission, as Quell would be telling him right now.
So, that's what he aims to do, joining the group that heads into the Tower, as ready as the soldier he could only ever hope to retire from being. The voices are loud as he climbs through — Just let go — but he knows the routine by now. The Kovacs of old would be more susceptible to the taunts but, as cheesy and ridiculous as even he himself might label it, his mind clings to the very things that have pushed him through two and a half years worth of missions on the Ximilia — friends, family, love — and he pushes on.
And then the orb is there, like a curse having waited for him to get this far, waited for all of them, to twist from within. By the time Kal Chomai appears, everything else moves fast, as Manaia steps in with the kind of smile he knows could only spell trouble. It's why he moves before he even really thinks to, the benefit of Envoy instincts guiding his body like reflex.
Or maybe it's the part of him desperate to put an end to all of this, to stop the orbs for good after all the hell he's witnessed them do on every single planet they've visited, as well as, selfishly, for both the forgetful ghost and loveless monster they've tried to make him into.
All he really knows is that, in an instant, his hands grip around Kal Chomai's arm and then it all goes black.
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"Fuck," is the first thing out of Kovacs' mouth when everything shapes itself around him again, feet staggering without balance on the floor before he can plant them firmly down to straighten himself up. When he peers up, he does a quick spin to look about the room, eyes studying every inch of wall and floor like it might spell out a clue as to where they are.
He doesn't know which is worse: the blackness they'd fallen into that felt like he'd been ripped out of his sleeve to sleep in nothingness again, the way he had for two and a half centuries, or what bears the look of an eternal, infinite prison.
Somehow, either way, it almost seems like an inevitability for someone like him to end up in a place like this.
His eyes go to Kal Chomai, and then to the orb in her hand. Kovacs takes a breath, closes his eyes briefly, another breath, and then opens them once more.
"I know," he says, finally answering her directly, expression softening as he keeps his gaze directed solely towards her, raising his hands carefully, palms held out to show his lack of aggression — as best as he can for a man his size, bearing a muscular build and countless scars like a man who's only ever known violence. His eyes, though, are the one feature that carries that thing he's been trying to cling to for as long as he could hope to — peace. "You're right. No one's safe. Not while that's—"
He takes another breath, his voice calming further.
"My name is Tak. And I'm here for the same reason you are. To keep everyone away from that thing in your hand."
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sorry but one more in honor of our girl kal ❤️ ty for this beautiful thread!!
Not-So-Invisible Toru Hagakure | My Hero Academia | The Roof
[Hagakure learns pretty quickly when her powers are taken from her. The funny thing is, Dr. Strange had already helped her conceal them before — but now it's certainly gone gone. There's no time to worry about that sort of thing, though! Not when there's so much to do. The attack is going to be launched on the Roof with very little time to prepare, and now that she is without her abilities? She'll need to truly rely on her capabibilities in hand to hand.
(Until she learns that Miss Rita Farr has given her some... interesting abilities... but that's something to worry about later!)
She instead stares worriedly at a collect of weapons that have been supplied by those living within the Roof, and... it's very obvious that this young lady, donning a shimmery singlet and hair that shines like opal, is very much unsure of what to pick. She rubs her chin and occasionally furrows her brow, reaching for a bladed weapon before pulling her hand away.]
II. To My Friends | Network Entry | UN: ~*~Hagakure~*~
[Just before things get hairy, a face appears in the network. A lot of people may not recognize her immediately, but her young, usually peppy voice certainly gives her away. Right now, though, she's a bit more serious.]
My personal goal was to tell you about the last time that I'd let someone down... The truth is, I still feel like I had let people down on the last mission. I had ended up being someone who needed to be rescued, and... I hadn't always been able to protect the civilians that needed it. Sometimes I worry that I haven't done enough to keep my teachers or friends safe in my world...
But the truth is, it won't help anyone for me to fall into that kind of despair.
And it won't help you, either! Focus on what you can do now, not what you couldn't before. Maybe... maybe that's something that these regrets can steal from us, if we're not careful, you know? If we focus on the past too much, we might stand to fail more in the future.
So... Even if I can't use my powers right now, I'm going to leave all of those regrets behind! And I'm going to do my best, but I won't let my past failures hurt my future victories! As long as I do that, I'll have finally found my real purpose aboard the Ximilia... The purpose that goes beyond the regrets that brought me here!
[The girl makes a fist, grinning.]
Let's do our best, everyone!
III. The Roof Battle
Get back!
[Maybe someone's about to give you a real wallop (or, you know, kill you, one of those), but have no fear — Hagakure is here! With a staff in hand, she gives it a trained twirl before smacking one of the — Dai’a Svar? The Roof clansmen? It all honestly depends on who is trying to murder you at the moment. While she's firmly pushing back against those from the Plains to keep them out and from murdering the Roof civilians, she also has no plans to kill any of them, either. If they can just keep them separate until the orb can be retrieved...
She's tried her best to quell any fighting around her, but it's to no avail.
And worse yet, her face is melting from the stress of it.
No, you read it right; by this point, Rita Farr's powers are absolutely rampant, and you may be horrified to find a teenaged girl with a half-melted face is reaching a goopy hand out to help you up.]
Are you okay?!
[... Sorry. Blobby powers are very difficult to handle.]
Minimus Ambus | Transformers IDW | Tower
[The bandit traveling with them, Ankbarl, continues to be amazed by the man disguised as Wei Wuxian, a mere human. Not only is he far stronger and more durable than any typical man, but he does not seem to tire even when he's lost count of the number of steps they climbed. Minimus can't go on indefinitely, but he doesn't slow down at the same rate as the organics.
He slows his pace to match the others when they get tired, stops to let them rest, and feels something tugging on his foot.] Oh, no. [He tears his feet away from the floor and grabs the nearest person by the shoulder to help them move along.] Keep going!
[He motions for Ankbarl to hop onto his back before resuming up the stairs, watching for anyone else that's growing weary. He can manage the stairs, but even Cybertronians can become exhausted, and stopping to help the others for too long has him sink further and further each time...]
06. The Orb
[First come the surface injuries. Metal scrapes that are more painful than they are dangerous. Then there's the denting. Memories of physical blows that knock Minimus to the side and has him stumble and drop Ankbarl. A hole suddenly explodes on his side, sending metal shrapnel scattering across the floor - a near-fatal wound from Overlord. With this injury, the holomatter avatar is dispelled, revealing the Cybertronian beneath.
The shock distracts Ankbarl from his pain temporarily: this human was actually a robot in disguise?!
Not that it helps Minimus when he's on his knees, in close view of the horrified faces from long ago babbling on and on.
He can't give up here. There's an orb to collect, and he will crawl, slowly if need be, while his limbs quiver and buckle under him.]
Ziggy Berman | Fear Street | The Tower
'There's no forewarning before your mind, once clear and focused on the task at hand, suddenly fills with strange visions that become more and more twisted, the more worked up you become. Nightmares of losing your sense of self, your mind, your will-power warp with hallucinations of turning against everyone you know and adore.'
[Ziggy has taken to unpleasant camping outside of the tower for the final home stretch, mostly because the tower actually can provide some reprieve from the wind and sun — but also, because others are steadily arriving to try to collect this damned orb. It's here, camping out, that people begin to seemingly lose their powers... or gain them.
But Ziggy's problem isn't that. She has no powers given to her, and none to give away, save for the handful of cultivating skills Wei Wuxian had helped her achieve. Instead, she's too busy combatting the visions and nightmares, the kind that leave her jolting awake in the cold desert air. The self-doubt and panic start growing from that cruel seed the orb had planted —
But she aims to combat it through what she's learned; legs crossed and palms upward on her knees, she breathes in, focuses, and quietly meditates, as she had been doing for more than a year now aboard the Ximilia. The terrible images whirling around her head are kept somewhat at bay... gives her a clearer head.
There's a break in time where she seems to notice there's someone nearby, perhaps baffled by what she's doing, or maybe just watching for the sake of passing time. Ziggy doesn't open her eyes — just says:]
You know, you could always just try it out. No better time like the present, when the orbs are trying to drive us batshit crazy.
PART II | 4.0 | The Staircase (Happy Birthday)
'You deserve to stay here, it croons an echo inside your mind. Think of everyone you’ve failed. Everyone who has ever loved you … trusted you. You’ve failed them, and you’ve failed here too. Who would forgive you? Who would care about you? Everyone will leave you behind. And isn’t that better? If they don’t, you’ll doom them to die here. Alone, desperate. Just let go.'
... This last orb really wants us to feel like crap.
[It's an unhappy mutter under her breath, as she continues forcing her way through the horrible, all-consuming stairway that leads them up into the tower. The cooridors are too narrow to use her jetpack any further, not without seriously whipping around the people near her in the tight space, so she elects to hoof it on foot like the rest of them. Big mistake, apparently. She's not sure when her energy had gotten so depleted, but she can feel her feet seeping deeper into the steps.]
Just — don't stop.
[She's telling the others ahead of and behind her, but she's also telling herself. Because she's just some human, someone still a kid... for... After a breathless moment, she laughs.]
Shit, I'm not a kid anymore. It's my birthday.
[She can't help the short, winded laugh that escapes her, before she stumbles. Her knee hits a step, and she can already feel it sinking in. It's not true, she has to tell herself. The orb has messed with them before, and it's just not true. People care. People could forgive her. And they could — they do care...
But... That trickle of doubt. It makes her feel so heavy.
And with that heaviness, comes a string of muffled curse words.]
PART II. | 5.0 & 6.0 | Reach Out
'But when you do, all you can hear now is their trembling voice, babbling in fear and speaking aloud everything that they are afraid of. Except when you study them, their mouth isn’t moving, which means it's the physical contact between you allowing you to hear them — and you can’t help them without touching them, can you? Because the contact appears to drown out your own pain, giving you a moment of clarity — or perhaps you are simply stronger together. You will need to keep in close proximity (via physical touch) to your teammates and decide between your worst fears being heard or continuing to endure the pain from all those injuries.'
[The pain is immediate and unrelenting, and she'd expect nothing less of this nightmarish ball of bullshit that muddles up their thoughts and feelings. She feels stupid yet again in the orb's presence for falling to its hypnotic whispers, but it's too late to course-correct it now. Instead, she screams and collapses, feeling every scar on her stomach burn white-hot as the night they had been created. Her leg, once broken before, joins in. The other leg, and then her arm —
And then the pain of injuries she'd inflicted on others. She's too absorbed in suffering to really process where each one had come from... but for some reason, she feels the horrible burning in her shoulder and thinks, ah, yeah, that's Wei Wuxian's. But pain has taught her a lot. Experience has numbed it enough for her that she can bite her lip, hard enough to draw blood, and roll herself onto her stomach.
She sees them there — her crewmember. Someone she knows all too well, or someone she only knows at a surface level. It doesn't really matter, in the end. The overwhelming sense of togtherness in their presence, it gives her the determination to keep moving. She forces herself to crawl toward them, wanting to help — needing to get them on their feet.
Her hand extends out to them, eyes watery but glowering with the Ximilia-born grit to push through.]
4.0
[ He might take issue with all the people who still call him boy, and while children should have a chance to be children, that doesn't mean they should be dismissed outright. ]
Congratulations on reaching another yearly milestone if you wish to have such sentiments.
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PART II. | 5.0 & 6.0 | Reach Out
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kicks in the door 1x month later, totally get if you wanna drop it!
Sherlock Holmes | Sherlock Holmes The Awakened (2023) | Tower
4.0: And I realized I could reach it if only I had tried
[ After asking if anyone could study these defenses in case they could prove valuable to containing the Orbs after the regrets are fixed, Sherlock begins the climb upwards. It's hard, tiring. However, Sherlock has been forcing himself to keep going on pure stubbornness for months since before he arrived on the station.A voice begins to whisper familiar words and lines into Sherlock's ears. He may have weakened mental defenses, but the message the voice taunts him with is one he knows already. A laugh passes his lips. ]
Tell me something I haven't been telling myself for years.
[ He pushes forward, gritting his teeth. He can be left alone after he sees his Watson again, to keep him from carrying the misplaced guilt of Sherlock's disappearance upon his shoulders. No one is more aware of his failures and solitude than he is.
Sherlock hears others struggle behind him and sees those before him do the same. This is just another one of those puzzles, and he will not stop now even as his feet sink into the steps. There's only one way to solve puzzles like these. ]
Keep moving! This is not like the quicksand of the plains. Rest someplace else!
5.0 & 6.0: But a wave of water comes to wash it out of my view
[ As the screams of pain fill the room, as Orbers feel every injury inflicted on them and by them, there is one Orber who does not scream. By all rights he should be. He's fought others as a child and as a man and has injured and been injured in the process. He was hit so hard that he lost his left canine baby tooth before he naturally should have. He faced numerous horrific deaths and trauma in that other world. As much as he gave and felt, he should be in horrific pain.Yet after he reaches for the purple jewel--speaking to him as the Occult Book did but with the gentleness of the earlier desert 221B hallucinations--Sherlock doesn't scream.
He can't scream when he's struggling for air.
Sherlock feels his throat crushed from the outside, contracting from the inside, and the burn of liquid in his lungs. Tears stream down his cheeks. Pain is etched on his every feature. Each breath of air is a real effort as he grasps for whatever purchase he can on the floor and crawl forward. ]
Wildcard
[ Want to do something else? Write a prompt or drop me a line at Sherry's journal,orb
A thud beside him alerts him to Sherlock's presence. Minimus rolls to his side and watches this brilliant man shake, his eyes wide. Two of them, dying just feet from the orb.
Minimus reaches out to grab Sherlock by the shoulder and pulls. ]
Pick whichever fears you want to hear/use
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5/6
Pick whichever fears you want to hear/use
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shinn asuka / gundam seed
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[ (Tomorrow, okay? Tomorrow.)
When he first regains consciousness, it’s difficult to distinguish the coolness of the empty cave from the chill of the lunar surface, the splashes of glowing moss from the spill of the Milky Way. The lead weight of regret and gullibility and misplaced hope are the same.
He had tried to do this talking things out stuff right. He mulled over everything Athrun had yelled at him from the other side of a battlefield and thought that if he tried explaining things in person, no one here needed to fight. No one really wanted to destroy the future.
Except the Dai’a Svar did, or Garam did. It’s one thing to fight for a fair place in this world, but fighting to drain it dry and move on to another one is just selfish, just stupid! They suffered when they shouldn’t have, but all they were going to do was bring more suffering to new worlds and new people. (Ah, again -- The moment you get that power, you become someone who makes others cry.) Is that what these two orbs want from this place? A war like the one Ahsoka fought, a whirlpool of hatred engulfing the universe?
Shinn knows that the task is to collect the two orbs, but he can’t let the orbs or Garam or the Dai’a Svar or anyone start a war like that. And maybe he’s just rationalizing, but if the orbs want that kind of chaos, then the team’s mission should probably be to stop the Dai’a Svar from carrying their chaos to the stars.
Unsteadily, he rises to his feet, brushing away tears before they can gather and fall. He’ll have to follow the Dai’a Svar to the city and try a second time, with weapons if words won’t work. And until then—
The lead weight settles a little deeper in his gut. He’s been an idiot, again. He should have told the team everything about the Dai’a Svar preparations as soon as he knew, but it had seemed wrong to help the clan leaders against people who just wanted to stop living in caves. But Garam or the Dai’a Svar aren’t just fighting to live, and they’re teamed up with one of the orbs. Until then, maybe what he shared before will be enough. Unconsciously, one hand slips into his jacket pocket, fingers curling around the old phone. Until then, hopefully what he’s shared will be enough.
He squares his shoulders and opens a video line. ]
joric | original character
7.0
8.0
closed to daisy
9.0
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[Daisy says through gritted teeth. She hasn’t forgotten what they did to Andy. When they turn to face her, Daisy instinctively raises her hand. Even if she did have her powers right now, there was no fighting what happens next. All of her negative thoughts threaten to break her all at once, and the weight of them has her knees buckling as she grips the wall. She tries to fight back against it, but it consumes her.]
Stop it.
[She tries not to sound so pleading, not wanting to give her the satisfaction.
All of the people she’s failed to save over the years, all of the times she’s seen and heard people disappointed in her. Losing Coulson, losing her mother. Tears roll down her cheeks as she tears her gaze away from the orb. But the memories and thoughts persist.]
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7.0
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Phoenix Wright // Ace Attorney // OTA
[ To say that the quest the orbers are on is generally not in his ballpark is an understatement. Different planets, hostile machines disguised as old friends, surviving a deadly desert, wars. His life has been far from boring, but it hasn't been this exciting.
He's also not in shape, and these stairs are killing him.
Just as he considers taking a break, he starts sinking. Normally, you don't sink into stairs, so it doesn't hit him at first. He feels it, looks down in confusion at his feet as the stairs envelop them ...
And he shrieks, flailing his arms as an instinctual reaction. Which isn't presicely conductive to keeping his balance, and anyone who's next to him or behind him may need to catch him. ]
5.0
[ Pain, on the other hand, is something he's used to. Sort of. The first - the impact of a car - knocks the wind out of him, but he stays stubbornly upright and tries to keep moving forward. Not that it works, he can't seem to lift his feet, and when the pain keeps raining down, he loses his focus.
Then, he loses his consciousness.
It's only for a moment - a flicker - and he comes to facedown on the floor with a groan of pain. As he tries to push himself up, his arms barely carry him, shaking with the effort as groans turn to screams and he reaches blindly for the nearest orber. ]
5.0 - use whichever fears you'd like
The Abyss calls for me.
I'll always end up alone.
I've gone mad.
It's all real.
Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!
I'm a danger to those around me.
I have no worth without my mind.
Water terrifies me.
I'll never be enough for anyone. ]
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Natasha Romanoff | MCU | OTA
[On teams with gods and super soldiers, Natasha has never been one of the ones with the super powers. Not unless you count hypercompetence and access to some of the most cutting edge tech available to SHIELD or Stark Industries, which maybe you should, but it's still it's a little different than coming out of a strange, unnatural spell and feeling something... different.
The fist thing Natasha really notices though, silly as it is, is that when she attempts to clear her head by taking a deep breath, she smells—well, she smells.
The time in the plains hasn't been great for her hygiene and now she knows it.]
...Holy shit.
[She rubs her leg after that, testing the area that had been injured during the approach of the tower. The lingering pain is entirely gone.
She casts a look over her shoulder, looking for the source of the power as thought it will be standing behind her. No such luck.]
Good timing, for me at least.
[But she knows who has this kind of power, and she has to wonder if Andy and Joe are all right.]
4.0
[The new powers give Natasha a nice boost when she could use one, but it only goes so far when it comes to climbing. Natasha is fit and her knees in decidedly better shape than they could be. But maybe it's the power fading, going back where it belongs, or maybe it's the tower itself. Maybe Andy's stamina isn't as limitless as she makes it seem. Whatever the answer is, the climb turns to a slog.
There's no stopping, though. The first thought of taking a breather puts an end to that idea.]
6.0
Hey...
[Natasha's voice quavers slightly, the cracks in her stoic face as much at the prospect of having her own fears revealed as seeing someone else's. Either way, she can't say she's usually interested in this kind of invasion of privacy.
Usually.
But the orbs have a way of incentivizing things she wouldn't usually consider, and she offers her hand.]
Looks like we're in this together, huh?
[It's meant to be reassuring. Or at least resolved.]
WILDCARD.
[You know how it works! Hit me up if there's something else you're into.]
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[Natasha and Newt have had the... fun... of being immortal together! Pour one out for Andy and Joe's anti-dead skills. Newt had learned about his new abilities in a far more concerning and interesting way, which is why as he rushes to approach her outside of the tower, she can see he's covered in dried and flaking blood. Generally, in the throat and chest area, which conveys the mauling he'd gotten at the teeth of an angry desert devil.
Despite this, the good doctor is in decent (sweaty) spirits!
Because he feels great. Physically, anyway.]
Heard you had to sit your search for the tower out for a while. You okay?
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Newton Geiszler | Pacific Rim
(CW: temporary character death via mauling)
[Newt had really not considered that he could have inherited someone else's powers, when the whole power fiasco happened. He was a little too busy worrying about everyone else who had lost their powers, especially considering the battle back at the Roof was going to be pretty grisly -- if he's going by what he's seeing of rebel groups collecting across the plains. Newt can't let it distract him, not when he's already pushed through the unrelenting wildlife out here in order to get to the Tower that houses one of two final orbs.
And with him, his pals. Maybe you're just crossing paths -- one heading to the Plains, the other to the Roof. Or maybe you're accompanying him to make sure he doesn't fall into anymore pools of quicksand. Either way, you're here when they're quite suddenly attacked by a pack of desert devils. In the midst of this violence, Newt can only curse and shakily retrieve his taser, admittedly regretful that he hadn't brought something more extreme of a weapon when he had the chance.
And like usual, he laments, he has to leave it to more capable hands.
Or at least, he does -- until he snaps back into focus, all too aware of a fellow orber's plight. Maybe they've fallen, shoved down and left vulnerable and at the mercy of this desert canine's large, sharp teeth. Maybe they had already had their leg bit into and had been thrown into the sand, and are struggling to get up through the pain, to get back into the fray. Maybe their back is turned while trying to finish off one of the monsters, and they don't see one speeding right for them.
Regardless, Newt acts on impulse. He's always been painfully impulsive, this guy.]
Leave them alone!
[It's what he yells, short and not particularly threatening, before he launches himself forward. The long, awful teeth don't sink into his crewmates flesh -- as Newt throws his arms out and tries to shield his crewmate from the worst of it, the teeth sink into his arm instead, shaking him violently left and right before he's unceremoniously slammed into the gritty dirt of these wastelands. Glasses go sailing and vanish from view. The hardness of the compact earth under his back leaves his vision throbbing and his ears hearing through a tin can.
He feels something hard and unrelenting snap around his throat, catching his neck and bursting blood from skin as if a white-hot balloon. He's too stunned to realize exactly what's going on, even has he looks at the desert devil's eyes hovering so close to him; the creature's whiskers keep scraping across his face as the beast starts mauling.
As he clumsily pushes at the creature's huge face with his tingling hands, he tries to yell and can only gurgle on the obvious.
Well, shit. I'm gonna die.]
PART II. TOWERING HEIGHTS
[But the good news is, he doesn't die. Okay, no, he does.
But he gets better, is the thing.
That's when he finally learns that he's inherited someone's immortality. Joe's, most specifically. It just sucks that the only way to know you've gotten it is to get mauled by a giant wolf-shaped beast. Go figure, huh? By the time he arrives to the towerhe's got no clothes to swap out, so he looks absolutely horrific on first viewing: his white button-up is almost completely rust brown, stiff and uncomfortable with blood that has dried in the harsh desert wind. His hands and neck are the same ugly shade of death, through his hands at least look like he's made an effort to try and wash them with a meager amount of canteen water. The flecks all over his face and on his slightly crooked glasses look like mud from afar.
Basically, he looks like the undead. A ghost.
A very healthy ghost.
He holds up a hand in greeting, outside of the Tower.]
Uh. Yo, dude. How's it going?
[Much like his other compatriots, Newt tries not to take too long to make his way into the Tower. Someone's gotta get up to the top and get that damn thing, right? Even if it's not him, the more that try, the merrier. He pushes forward with an admittedly higher confidence than he probably should have. Being able to not die, albeit temporarily, has really given him a little extra pep in his step as he makes his way up those horrible stairs and their unending whispers.
When someone behind him falters, Newt whirls around, more than ready to offer a palm out to grab.
(Sorry about the sight of him, though.)]
Hey, don't listen to that emo disembodied bitch; it's totally full of shit.
Look how far we've gotten, huh? It doesn't know what it's talking about.
It's just jealous that this is all it's got going for it.
The T-800 | The Roof (feel free to wildcard running into him whenever, around there!)
[The T-800, now the owner of many names depending on who you ask, has decided to remain at the Roof and help keep both the defending and offending groups at bay from one another. As best he can, anyway; terminators are particularly gifted at missions that involve acts of violence or protection, but he can only do so much as one solitary model out here. Regardless, he wastes no energy in apprehending the assaulting Dai’a Svar. He also wastes no time in stopping the Roof clans from killing them in return. His loyalties will always ultimately lie with the Ximilia crew, no matter the situation.
But as he had been commanded by John Connor, he has not killed. Not intentionally, nor directly. His attacks are nonfatal as they are swift and calculated. He breaks arms, he impales legs, he hogties a number of people who have attempted to punch him across the face with little to no success.
Either way, you have a companion of sorts who will look out for you.
A fighting partner, if you will.
He isn't much of a talker, but he sure is reliable.
... However, he is still a nonmagical entity combating very magical entities. He's not without some damage from the numerous gifts that the Dai’a Svar use against them -- fire, rock, electricity, elements that have scraped and bruised his very organic exterior (and almost short circuited him at least once, though he was mercifully able to reboot without issue). It by no means slows him down enough that he can't assist the others, but it does give him a few staggering hiccups.
One of the Dai’a Svar in particular seems keen to attack both Bob and another orber as a final bid for victory -- the man in question, bald with faded tattoos adorning his scalp, cradles a broken arm with the other hand before glowering and raising his palm outward. The T-800 does not have a translation for the words the man speaks, but he senses danger quiet immediately: the shift in pressure in the air, the reverberations underfoot, the temperature increasing in miliseconds...
He quickly wraps himself around the other orber and turns them away from the attack, his broad back prepared to take the hit. And take it he does -- there's a blast like a bomb, loud and fiery, strong enough that it throws both him and the protected party to the ground. The man had apparently detonated himself, in a way; sacrificed his life in order to try and wipe out those against his cause.
Bob can relate, somewhat.
As the smoke clears, Bob sits up, looking... uh...
Well, he's been better.]
Are you injured?
[He has a working hand; sure, one has been blown off in the blast, but the other can provide first aid if need me. (... strange, he has never had to perform first aid before; prior to his rewiring, he considered it a positive if a human was dying in front of him).]
andromache | the old guard
closed to daisy johnson
pre invasion
[ andy has been lying low since her encounter with jial bryn, only going out when she's covered fairly head to toe, but mostly hanging out in an empty space. joe and joric keep her fed so she doesn't need to interact much with other people, and despite the nature of being shut in, it doesn't make her too restless. the days that pass are a blur, like so many, and she's used to that much. ]
[ it's only when she hears about the upcoming attack and the collapse of the defense system that she dares to poke her head out a little bit more. the locals are bristling, but she's looking for familiar faces. ]
[ she knows daisy is on her way to find her, but she's impatient too, lingering in the threshold and catching sight of her as she approaches. she tilts her head in the doorway, in a small gesture meant to usher them both inside the humble abode, but there's a grin on andy's face too, happy to see her. ]
Looking for me?
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closed to natasha romanoff
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