where we're going--

[polymods]

✖ EVENT HORIZON

Ⅰ. ARRIVAL
You can read all about your character's arrival in the game lore.
There has always been some confusion as to whether or not the ferry cuts through sea or sky, but this month as you glide along you will find yourself more and more convinced that it is the latter. It is nigh impossible to see where you are headed, the way forward shrouded in darkness.

At first you think the lights ahead are stars.

The ferry docks inside of a metallic bay of some kind. It’s an extension of what must be the island, although this one does not resemble any earthly land mass. It appears to be a deliberately constructed structure, contained on all sides. Maybe you’re familiar enough with technology or science fiction enough that you realise it resembles a space station more than an island.

Once you’ve disembarked from the ferry, you will find that you cannot go outside of the structure.

Inside, there are seemingly endless corridors for you to explore. The halls on the upper deck are rounded, metallic, with lights set at regular intervals. Here there are chambers roughly the length and width of a single bed, with sufficient height for a person to crawl in and sit up on the bed. There is a television screen set in the wall at the foot of the bed by the door, and sockets for electronics. That is all.


Also on this floor is a mess hall where you can get beige, mostly tasteless nutritional sludge dispensed from machines. Water and coffee are also available, likewise dispensed from machines. (There is a cookbook hidden on a shelf written by one Serak the Preparer, but no ingredients anywhere.) There are private showers and bathrooms, a small gym, and rooms clearly meant as places for people to sit and talk. There is a medical bay, although there is no staff. In fact, the whole place seems empty.

There are some rooms that are locked - these look like offices. The doors to these rooms are extremely difficult to break down, but if you have superhuman strength you could manage it. Or maybe you’re clever enough to work the electronic panels beside the doors.

Inside you will find round monitors on the walls and square tablet-like devices on desks. Attempt to work any of these and a soft, pleasant but emotionless voice will inform you that you do not have access. You can try to speak to the AI - called MUTHER - but it is supremely uncooperative. Someone very good with technology could use the tablet the old fashioned way, perhaps, to access files. You might want to be careful, though - MUTHER might decide to retaliate. Harshly.

There doesn’t seem to be a temple anywhere readily apparent.

Notes:
1. The High Temple and anything characters may have stored there is only accessible to those who are experiencing their first island outside of the TDM via a marked door. Everyone else must make do with what is available.

2. Please remember to mark threads appropriately with Content Warnings when necessary.

3. The televisions play mostly game shows. You can also find a set of controllers for it and play Pong. Just Pong.

4. MUTHER will not deliberately kill any people on the station - her programming forbids it. She is not above releasing hallucinogenic gas into the air vents, though.

5. Have fun!

---

Ⅱ. CONSCIENCE
CW: psychological trauma, threat of death.
It’s easy to get lost; nearly identical corridors branch off from one another. As you walk along you gradually become convinced that someone is following you. Periodically you’ll hear footsteps, a sigh, a rustle of cloth. But every time you turn around you see nothing… unless it’s one of your fellow Travelers. Or maybe you run into them because you’re so busy looking over your shoulder.

Regardless, as you walk along the lights in the corridor flicker, and when they turn back on you will find someone you know standing directly in your path. Someone who you know absolutely cannot be there.

Maybe they died. Maybe you haven’t spoken in years. Whoever they are, the feeling they inspire within you is one of intense guilt. You did something to this person, something for which you think you can never be forgiven.

The apparition might speak, or it might just watch you with silently accusing eyes. You begin to wither under its gaze, feeling weaker and weaker until you can barely stand. You just want to lay on the floor and close your eyes… maybe forever.

Your fate rests in the hands of whoever is with you or finds you. All they have to do is introduce a smidgen of doubt into your mind, a recognition that maybe it isn’t all your fault. Of course, that means you might have to tell them what you did.

Oh, dear.

Notes:
1. The severity of the offense is of course up to the player - this can be deadly serious, or played for laughs. No matter how it is played the only way to save a character from sleeping on the floor until they die from dehydration is to convince them of even the possibility that they might not be guilty. They do not have to feel completely absolved.

---

Ⅲ. STOWAWAY
CW: monstrous creatures.
The lower decks of the station are darker, more utilitarian looking. These are corridors that lead to rooms full of computers and machinery that keep the station running so it’s probably best to keep out of there.

There are also storage bays filled with both prosaic wooden crates and large metallic pods. Most of these are locked up tight. But not all. Investigate some of the pods and you’ll find that the floor around them is wet with some sort of milky, slimy substance that sure seems like it came from a living organism.

Maybe you should get out of here.

Before you can get good and gone to the upper decks, however, you find exactly what you probably didn’t want to unless you have a very exciting Tinder profile: an alien.

At least eight feet tall, with pale almost translucent skin, the creature has an elongated skull and a mouth that hosts two sets of jaws like a moray eel. It has a whiplike tail and spiky protrusions along its upper back. It is bipedal, and very, VERY fast.

Better hope you’ve got something to fight with! Your chances of survival are definitely greater if you work with a partner.

And you better hope there’s just the one.

Notes:
1. The aliens are extremely dangerous, but they CAN be killed. Their blood is thick and yellow but is not acidic or poison.

---

Ⅳ. TEMPLE
CW: potential insanity, violence.
If you wander the dark lower decks long enough, you will find yourself moving ever inward toward the very center of the station. There is a door there that is supposed to be locked, but often isn’t. It’s waiting for you, beyond that door and down a dark corridor: the station’s heart.

The room the solitary corridor opens into is round, walls sloping gently up to a domed ceiling. In the middle of the room is a machine of some kind: a series of concentric thick metal rings rotate in different directions around a sphere. The only noise it makes is the gentle swooshing of the circles as they spin out, up, around.


The air feels heavy and charged. It’s not pleasant.

Before you can leave, all of the rings line up so that they appear to radiate out from the sphere in the center. Light flares, and then in the space where the sphere once was you can see it:

Home.

It’s your homeworld, perhaps exactly as you left it, or perhaps earlier or later along in the timeline. It may be pleasant, or it may be awful, but it is undeniably the place from which you came. The place where you belong.

Stare into this portal home long enough and the compulsion to return will slip over you. You just need to jump into the glowing, trembling center of that dimensional gate.

Whoever is with you, however, realises that leaping headfirst into an unknown dimension might not be the smartest idea you’ve ever had, especially considering how ominous the whole place feels. They might be able to talk you down. Hopefully they can talk you down, because the longer you stare at the portal the more convinced you become that you MUST leap into it, and the only way to do so is to kill whoever is trying to get in your way.

If instead you turn away from the dimensional gate, the lights will flare once more before the rings resume their movement. That brief glimpse of home is gone. In its place is the sound of soft voices; people you have left behind, calling out to you with accusations of things left undone, begging to be told why you won’t come home...

These voices will follow you throughout the ship. They are not constant, but they never leave you alone for very long. They won’t be silent until you give them an answer to the question of why you have chosen to remain.

Notes:
1. If characters DO jump into the gate… They can pass through and emerge on the opposite side gravely injured or completely out of their minds. Or you may use this as a very dramatic exit from the game.

Is anybody out there listening?

Network · Logs · OOC · Memes · Plurk

Comments

[neverwither]

( Uncomfortable is right. Her android-ness being on blatant display isn’t something she’s entirely happy with. But at least they’re uncomfortable together? And what’s a little discomfort between friends allies? )

Oh, no. It’s just a little different to interface when he devices are, well, inhabited, for want of a better word. It’s interesting.

( See? She’s up to the challenge. She’s smiling. This is all totally fine. )

Is there a particular test you’re looking for or would you like all we may be capable of accessing?

[unkindled_madness]

I see.

[Sephiroth absolutely cannot read her well enough right now to pick up on her discomfort. She says she's fine so she must be.

He concentrates more attention than he needs to on rolling up his sleeve. Go through the motions, this used to be routine.]

I had thought to attempt... blood typing and DNA analysis.

[neverwither]

( Chloe is very mindful to not make any sort of face. As suspected, this type of analysis seems intensely personal. Though none of what he might be going through is being addressed directly, at least he’s not alone in it.

A glance over to him to see how he’s getting on has her doing a double take. She nods to his ScryWatch as she speaks: ) It’s quite a nice shade, isn’t it?

[unkindled_madness]

[He blinks over at her, not immediately understanding what she means. ...Oh.]

...I suppose it's more my color.

[Does that count as levity? It matches his eyes now.]

[neverwither]

( It counts as levity in Chloe’s world. Then again, Chloe isn’t the best judge of levity. Regardless, it makes her smile. )

Do you have any idea what might have prompted the change? In the name of scientific enquiry.

[unkindled_madness]

I failed to catch the precise moment.

I was with Loki.

[There are a number of things that might have counted as "growth." Which irritates him somewhat, given he doesn't believe in this whole system.]

[neverwither]

Ah, yes. He seems to be a good person for thoughtful conversation. A valuable ally to have.

( Irritated as he is, she’s pleased by the development. Of course, not all development is necessarily measured by the Ancient’s scale. Still. Progress is a positive. )

[unkindled_madness]

He is more than an ally.

[He won't apply the F word but he can acknowledge that much.]

[neverwither]

( Again, Chloe doesn’t let it deep through into her expression too much but she’s delighted at this revelation. Surely that in itself would be enough to shift his ScryWatch.

See, Sephiroth? Actual connections with others can be okay. Acknowledging them can be okay, too. )

It’s good to see the two of you get along so well.

[unkindled_madness]

[He almost asks her why, but sometimes people just... want good things for you? Which is weird. Caring about people is weird, Chloe. It's complicated and confusing and it had better be worth it.]

Hm. It is... uncommon.

We should get on with this.

[Resuming preparations for blood drawing.]

[neverwither]

( That would be exactly it. Chloe wants good things for it. And being Chloe, she’s firmly convinced it will all be worth it in the end.

Because it has to be, right?

As he continues to tend to the biological side, she tweaks the technical. MUTHER couldn’t possibly refuse running diagnostics on an extremely sick crew member now, could they? There must be an element of ‘keep all the (presumed) humans alive’ programming and shutting them down now would surely be in violation of that, wouldn’t it?

Admittedly, it’s a little odd to be manipulating MUTHER. Briefly, she wonders how sentient the AI might be.

But that really isn’t the point right now. )

Alright. I think we should be just about ready over here.

[unkindled_madness]

One moment.

[It is a little awkward doing this one-handed, but it never even crosses his mind to ask for assistance. After a few moments he walks over to join her with the sample vials in his left hand and his right bent snug at the elbow in lieu of bandaging.

He looks around for the appropriate place to input them for analysis...]

I don't expect...

The results won't be... normal.

[neverwither]

( For a second, Chloe just looks at him. She won’t say it’s okay. It might not be. Nor will she say it doesn’t matter. Because it does. )

We’ll figure it out.

( As he has people to help him do that. If and when he’s ready. )

I could put some gauze on your arm, if you’d like?

[unkindled_madness]

It's fine. [Already healing. It's just a pinprick, it never takes long.]

But this...

[How much will this really determine? It will tell him he isn't human, but it won't tell him what he is instead.

But it will be data. One piece of the picture he was denied, and if he doesn't understand its full meaning now, at least he'll have seen it. He pushes through the hesitation, and places the vial in the machine.]

Confirmation of a negative is a start, isn't it?

[neverwither]

It is. And data isn’t a definition. At least, I don’t think it has to be.

( Though Chloe does have… some bias in that area. But maybe that’s part of why she’s here.

With the vial in place, she sets the tests he’s requested to run. As much as she doesn’t want to come across as coddling, she can’t help her gaze continually flicking over to him for a few seconds at a time. )

[unkindled_madness]

...I wouldn't mind one.

[Even if it turns out that he is no different from one of Hojo's cobbled-together monstrosities. Isn't it better to know? Better to know and come to terms with it than to keep fearing it.

His attention remains fixed firmly on the monitor, awaiting the results, and he doesn't notice her glances.

The blood typing completes first. Unidentifiable. No known type. He sucks in a long breath, and lets it out.]

[neverwither]

You've always seemed like someone who decides his own definitions.

( And it makes much more sense now. If he isn't sure who - or what - he may be, there's a security in clear cut roles. Soldier. Ally. She, too, knows that sense of security. Or she used to, anyway.

When the results start coming in, Chloe shifts herself so he can have full view of the monitor. Unless something goes awry, she doesn't need to be manning the computer. It's not like she's looking, but she gleans enough from both the screen and his reaction to it.

She rests a hand upon his shoulder. )

[unkindled_madness]

I don't know about that.

[She may be right about the sense of security. He was ushered into SOLDIER, but it gave him a clearer and more desirable identity than anything he'd had before. He was a part of something.

He tenses at her hand on his shoulder, but he doesn't pull away.

The DNA analysis is... more complicated. The monitor starts cycling through raw data, and he doesn't have the background to interpret it. Some of the lines likewise have unknowns, but... not all of them. Maybe some of it could be human, but maybe he shouldn't hold onto that.]

Can it- Can this be printed?

[neverwither]

I can certainly try.

( This time, no white plastic hand makes contact with the computer - Chloe just has a focused look about her. The printer whirs to life, churning out the onscreen data. )

Would you also like for me to store a copy?

[unkindled_madness]

[Sephiroth blinks, finally tearing his gaze from the screen to look at her.

Does he want her to store it? It isn't as though he forbade her from looking, but simply glancing over it now is different from storing data on him. Even if he's certain it wouldn't be like those restricted files in the Shinra building, she wouldn't keep it from him--]

I think... not. For now.

[neverwither]

( She gives him a small nod. ) Understood.

( Nope, she wouldn’t keep anything from him. Or access anything without him. Purely a precaution, in case anything happens to the hard copy or MUTHER decides to scramble the data. )

Is there anything else you need?

[unkindled_madness]

[He shakes his head slowly, looking back at the monitor.]

Not unless... there's some sense to be made of this.

[neverwither]

Why don’t we have a look over it together? See what we can parse?

[unkindled_madness]

[Look over it... together. Before, he always imagined gaining access to his files as a solitary venture.

Everything was solitary.]

...all right.

[neverwither]

( This isn’t an area she has a vast amount of knowledge in but she can see that his prediction of the results not being normal appears to be accurate.

Silently focused once again, Chloe’s LED quickly flickers a golden yellow. )

I believe files from previous analysis may still be in here… Would you like me to try to access them for comparison? It could help us understand more of what we’re seeing.