∎ ETRAYA MODS ∎ (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
etrayamods) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
etrayamemes2024-06-12 03:15 pm
etrayamods) wrote in etrayamemes2024-06-12 03:15 pm
Entry tags:
TDM 003
 ⏵ arrival ⏴ NOTES\WARNINGS: Space horror, existential horror, clown horror, potential graphic violence & psychological trauma. Please add additional warnings as needed within threads. Your arrival does not go as anticipated. While most Etrayans wake up in the hospital, you find yourself somewhere else entirely. Not within the city bubble, not on the planet, but in a desolate room aboard a space station. There’s an endless mechanical whirring that can be heard from anywhere from just behind the walls, although the cause of the noise itself is difficult to discern. Instead of Aurora’s voice telling you of your situation, you are greeted by a man running past the sliding door of your room, opening it, and potentially a couple of others along the hallway. He stops just at the edge of the hallway, a hesitant smile on his lips as he raises a hand to the back of his hair. "Hey! Sorry about the uh–unexpected vacation? Trip? You can call me Alex, I’m one of the hands here aboard the Titan Eight. I’m sure you’ve noticed, but you don’t really belong here. Aaaaand neither do we! Haha, so at least we’ve got that in common. Right? We’re uh, stuck in the gravitational pull of a black hole of some sort and haven’t found a way out yet, and we keep getting random people pulled aboard." His hand smacks the wall next to him, and it opens up - revealing small handheld communication devices lined up behind it. "As you can probably tell, we’re getting used to it. Anyway. Feel free to take one of these, and read up a bit on the ship if you want. There’s a map, you were given a translator—" With a hand dropping to his collar, where a small button rests, "soon as we found you down below. Didn’t want you waking up and freaking out, did we? Just don’t break anything, please? Or don’t break it worse than it is. If this thing gets a big enough hole in it, or we run out of oxygen, or it, gods forbid, explodes, we’re all dead. I’ve got a thing I’m on the way to, but our AI, Aria, can lend you a hand with whatever. Just click her little icon on the comm. She's a bit basic, but she gets the job done." With a little salute, Alex turns himself around to run further down the hallway, leaving new arrivals to themselves and their little communicators. Looks like we’re not on Etraya anymore, Toto. For new arrivals, they will find themselves waking up in the sleeping quarters of Titan Eight, a space station that has found itself trapped just outside of what looks like it must be a black hole. The station is running low on supplies, but it has been for a very, very long time. Or at least, the crew seems to think it has. They’ll say they have two weeks' worth of supplies left for those currently on board, except every time they go back to their supplies, it’s still two weeks left regardless of the amount of time it’s been since they’ve last checked it. Even the crew seems to think it’s odd, looking at one another in confusion every time they’re counting their stock only to realize that it’s still drastically low but never too low. How long have they been here? Years, some seem to think. There are numerous children on board, some as young as nine, but no one on board is aging either. They have tried to track how much time has passed before, but it seems they’ve never been able to track it successfully. Journal entries all carry the same date even as crew members try to mark them differently — marks made on the ship and on bodies fade after midnight as if they had never been there to begin with. This is where the mission, and Etrayans comes in: remove the space station from the black hole’s gravitational pull. There are no further instructions, no limitations on how to accomplish this, and they are not given a time frame. Newcomers will not have this mission information on hand until someone who has stepped foot on Etraya proper can inform them. All of those who drop onto the ship were originally meant to be brought to Etraya and similar city bubbles, but the same pull that keeps the ship by the black hole seems to be preventing whatever method Echo and Aurora are using to get people to Etraya and is instead pulling them here. Titan Eight is not just an average space station. It was built by residents of Caerys 2, and used to serve as a vacation home for those who can afford the luxury rooms in the fourth quadrant. The first quadrant houses a carnival of sorts, the second hosts numerous vendors, and the third is where the crew, and unexpected guests, can be found during their off time. The fourth quadrant houses some of this galaxy's richest families. A mother and her two sons walk through the hallways, carrying umbrellas despite there being no natural light on board, but a closer look at them might explain it: they're so pale, their skin looks clear, dark black veins visible through skin. Their sclera are black, and their 'hair' isn't hair but long black feathers. Numerous guests aboard the ship don't appear to be human; rather, species' of all kinds. An engineer is more dragon than anything else: his long body extends throughout the engine facility, taking up a significant amount of space, but given the dragon himself seems to be leading all efforts to keep the ship running, everyone else tries to work around him.  ⏵ whirlwind whimsy ⏴ During the daytime, Titan Eight is fun. Numerous rides are strewn about the wide open area: a massive carousel, ferris wheel, bumper cars, and various others. A seer will offer to tell your future, and performers gather in the big top, showing off their ability to bend themselves into unnatural shapes, or their lack of fear as they balance on thin wire high above the ground without a net to catch them, should they fall. One popular ride is the Tunnel of Love: a small boat that only fits two and steers itself through a tunnel that goes under the carousel. Soft, serene tunes play as various images play over the tunnel walls. While those who have been aboard Titan Eight for a significant period will likely see hearts, short videos of people holding hands, watching the sunset while swinging together - it's not the same for those displaced onto the space station. Instead, they'll see doorways into other worlds: an underwater city full of humanoid beings, a city bubble that looks like a small suburban area, a city built out of trees, or perhaps their own worlds: images of what they may be missing out on, or what could be. The House of Mirrors is also popular: a carnival worker will tell those passing by that it shows you other versions of yourself - who you could be, what you might become, who you once were, or the person you wish you were. Rumor has it the mirrors will whisper to you, telling you what you can do to avoid certain outcomes, or how to achieve others. There are also numerous carnival games set up: Balloon Darts, Ring Toss, Rifle Ranges - anything you could imagine at a carnival is set up somewhere. And given this is meant to be a luxury ship, everything is free of charge.  ⏵ midnight entertainment ⏴ Titan Eight being stuck in the pull of the black hole doesn't seem to be the only problem. When the clocks onboard read 0000 hours, everything shifts. The fun carnival feels eerie. Children's laughter can be heard bouncing off the walls — sometimes sounding bright and cheerful; other times sounding downright sinister. Crew members and carnival workers suggest staying out of the first quadrant. After 2230 hours, they exit their workstations and find other spaces to hunker down in for the night. No one wants to be around when the excessively tall clown walks out of the House of Mirrors, dragging other clowns of various shapes and sizes right through the mirrors themselves. Carnival workers will explain they have tried breaking the mirrors but given how the ship resets at midnight, attempts to destroy everything have proved futile. The clowns themselves are odd. The tallest one has a smile filled with blood and a laugh that sounds like it belongs to a young child rather than the creature it is. It carries around a bloodied carving knife but doesn't reach for anyone who goes near it. Some clowns cry and sob, ripping fingernails from their nailbeds as they claw at the door leading into the central hub. Others laugh and scream, wandering around the open carnival area to cause damage wherever possible. Some hurt each other, or the other creatures wandering the carnival area. Most of them will attack on sight. During the nighttime hours, this is their area. And yet many remain around the House of Mirrors, guarding it, as if there is something inside of it that they must protect. Getting past them is near impossible: when one clown falls, two more rise out of the mirrors. When the mirrors are destroyed, the tall clown drags its hands against the broken pieces of glass, helping it to reform. By 0500 hours, the clowns have made their way back into the mirrors, taking along with them whatever they had been so protective of.  ⏵ toucan play that game ⏴ While the fourth quadrant is generally reserved for guests who can afford to pay for the space and the staff who manage it, with the station stuck, they've opted to open the area to allow others to come and go during the day. In the center is a massive aviary, filled with birds of all shapes, sizes, and colors. Some of them have no feathers yet still manage to fly, some look as if they should have gone extinct thousands of years ago, and others are - completely unidentifiable, alien. Most of them are peaceful. But not all of them. Off in the far Southwest corner is a bird with three eyes, a long black tail, and a beak full of massive teeth. While it will not attack others, it will open its beak and speak in a voice that mimics one familiar to those wandering past it: a friend, a sibling, or someone who had long since passed, and says the last thing they remember that person saying to them, repeating it over and over again as long as they stay close to it. Outside of the aviary, there are exercise facilities, sunning rooms, a massive swimming pool and hot tub, areas for pets to rest and play with one another, and a large ballroom where dances are thrown once weekly. Residents dress up in their best gowns and suits, don masks, and dance away the stress of their situation. Staff and displaced are invited to join, although staff are encouraged to come to every other dance, so there are still enough to man the ballroom.  ⏵ current player notes ⏴ Aurora approaches those currently stationed on Etraya individually, informing them of the mission at hand. She tells them that she is capable of releasing them much in the same way Echo originally pulled them onto the planet, but with a 'tether' still attached to keep them from getting lost too long. Time does not function the same way on the ship as it does on the planet; she suspects their time being on the ship won't register as any time at all to those remaining on Etraya, and that when they are pulled back, it will likely be as if they never left to begin with. Current characters are not pulled to Titan Eight during missions happening in game but in the downtime between them. Small rescue ships are docked at the Southeastern island, and she will send individuals off a few at a time. The ships will pass through the barrier without issue, but won't travel far at all outside of Etraya before they blip out of existence, and reappear in Titan Eight's orbit. They will also get a friendly introduction speech from Alex, and a ship communicator for any network-related needs while aboard Titan Eight! Earpieces will not work aboard the ship. When characters are pulled back, it will not be on rescue ships. Instead, they will find themselves suddenly dissipating at midnight, as the rest of the changes aboard the ship shift back to how they had been originally. The rescue ships disappear at midnight, along with the player characters. This TDM covers June to September. The TDM is game canon, meaning everything happening above is occurring within the game properly, and threads can be kept as game canon even if a character does not app. Time does not function the same on Titan Eight as on Etraya! Characters can be brought onto Titan Eight at any time and stationed there long before any of the Etrayans arrive to assist. For any questions relating to the contents of this log, please reply to our mod queries comment. All other questions can be directed to the FAQ. This is going to be an ongoing plot, which characters are welcome to try and solve, even if they aren't yet in the game! |
ᴡʜɪʀʟᴡɪɴᴅ ᴡʜɪᴍꜱʏ
She could amend that truth, but she wouldn't. Not to him.
There are too many reasons why she couldn't—wouldn't—now.
It does not stop the rush of her heart to look at any of the mirror reflections rather than the man she stops a safe distance behind, whether in front of him or through the eyes of what he's seeing. It hasn't yet started playing with her demons yet, but she has assumptions already of what they might be should she step up to see them. ]
There've definitely been better looks than that one.
quietly inhales emotions
but unlike his own face in the mirror, this one speaks on her own, and his eyes lock in directly on her, locked like a spell. is she just a lost whisper deep past the mirror's glass or — is she really there behind him?
his body turns slowly, entirely expecting her to disappear completely when he directs his eyes to follow, but she remains there, seemingly more real and solid than all the other images reflecting back at him. ]
Jean ... ? [ he whispers tentatively, almost scared to say it too loudly, like she might disappear the second it's spoken. she doesn't.
and yet, he's still not entirely convinced, trying to brace himself for disappointment. ] You're not real.
~has ALL the EMOTIONS right there with you~
(And didn't she know all too well about that?
Being that. Often, the very worst of it.)
She doesn't move. The edges of her mouth turn upward as though she can't quite defuse the relief of seeing him—his face; those tired, beautiful eyes—with the truth that her mind can hear, feel, and know. (The way he's out of key. Like Scott. Except...somehow even more so, too?) If it's a smile she can't quite stop, it's tempered soft. Rueful. Sympathetic. ]
Very much real, if not exactly who you think I am.
[ Does it pain her heart a little to toss out that line immediately?
It does. But she'd rather she didn't end up where she did with Scott before. ]
no subject
but for a man so sensitive to smells, to sounds, to sights, he can be well attuned to differentiating between dream and reality. and the woman in front of him wasn't the former. but just as well, he can pick up on even the most subtle differences in reality too, and this jean — well, she's certainly jean, but not quite ... his jean.
not that it makes him love her any less.
just as slow as his turn had been, his steps move at an equal pace as he begins to move towards her, eyes carefully watching, almost afraid to blink even for a split second. ]
Real, but not ... — [ he quiets himself, realizing for now, it doesn't make too much of a difference. ] If ... I touch you, you won't just disappear?
no subject
Because he looks—feels—so tired. Worn.
Wherever he'd come from, still lingering all around it.
So wary—and still, like Scott, there's that ember of hope.
Deep, deep down, under a wound that hasn't stopped bleeding,
but can't drown it out either.
If there's an irony in the fact she knows the Logan in her world has met more than a handful of other versions of her, it doesn't match up now, even as the thought flits across. (Again.) For different reasons this time. But his question. There's a moment she thinks this isn't smart and even which one of us could this hurt more, and still all she does is so simple.
There's a small shake of her head,
and her voice is quiet. ] No.
[ She may not quite be sure if she's alive, or dead, or something outside-and-inside of both,
but she won't vanish, and she's not sure if she wants to tell him to stop. It's been so long. ]
no subject
he's tired of always seeing it end the same, of meeting tragedy again and again like a film spinning right back to the beginning.
and yet, he doesn't stop moving, still too addicted to opportunity, to live in those brief fleeting moments of having her back. with her answer, his feet take him to stand directly in front of her, taking another pensive few seconds to look at her closely from this answer, his eyes as soft in their stare as the day he'd first fallen in love with her, when he'd first seen her at all.
fingers lift tentatively, until they can brush gently against her cheek, grazing slow until he can cup her skin with his palm — warm. she's so warm. and alive. ]
Jean ... [ he whispers, inhaling a breath. ] You're here.
no subject
At the tentativeness.
At the brush of callused fingers,
still waiting for her to be a dream.
At the gentleness that people never expect of him,
and the way, too, has moved in and filled up her life. Heart.
Jean's eyes fall half shuttered, her heartbeat skitters, breath falling silent, held, as she can't resist the way her cheek turns into his touch, into the warmth warm, solidness of his hand. Letting herself fall into it, in a way she knows she probably shouldn't, hand coming up to curve over the back of his, keeping it close at least a few seconds longer. ]
no subject
but the woman standing before him now doesn't seem to hold any of that darkness, and for now, before he has to ask any questions of what this all this, how she's here, how he's here, if any of his actions when jumping into the past had changed their future — he'll allow his own selfishness.
he touches her and he can hear every shudder of her breath until it stills, how her heart races, and the added heat of her hand slipping over his own, warmth upon warmth.
he exhales a relieved breath, and he boldly brings his other arm around her, reeling her in close to him as he noses against her cheek, taking in her scent, feeling the heat of her body and how her blood pumps through it, alive and here. ]
no subject
But things have always been so much rawer with Logan. With his shameless directness and intensity. But at full contrast, the images slide through her mind, and she also stiffens on contact with them. Her—the other her—dead in his arms. Looking down at his claws impaled in her stomach. The fire and darknes, desperate and pleading and dangerous, right before.
How many times has she been in that moment, have they? How many times has she felt those claws slide through her, so sharp and so sudden it almost take two-to-three seconds for the pain to catch up. Not even all for the worst reasons—some were mercy caused by events they couldn't solve without any dark tint upon except the X-Men's newest fight with someone—but all of them involved The Phoenix in one way or another. Was that universal, too? Were their lives and deaths always this tangle, everywhere?
Jean pulled back, even if it was barely even inches, a furrow of confusion drawing a line between her brows as she tried to cling to something besides her body. Besides the fact this wasn't for her, the way it wasn't for him. It was all for people who weren't here. Like with Scott. (Not that her pounding heart was listening.) ] You've touched the Phoenix.
[ And then, because she's looking for it, because she can't miss it now that she's reaching for it with her mind,
with the powers of The Phoenix, now and forever her power—it's not only that. Her green eyes widen.]
You've been in The White Hot Room.
no subject
there's a longing to kiss her, lips brushing enough along the pulsing of her neck to nearly mimic the urgency, but he's scared that the moment he does, that's when the nightmare might come alive again, and just as she always does, she'd simply disappear.
yet she's already drawing away and the motion coaxes him to lift his head, to catch the stern focus of her eyes, his own heartbeat and hers still loud in his head.
the white hot room. is that what it's called? ]
I've been wherever you are. [ he raises his hand again, palm gentle to her jaw, careful. ] For you. [ always for you. ] But I couldn't stay.
no subject
Her hands suddenly can't figure out what to do with themselves, caught between what feels natural and the reminder of what isn't. Even as Logan stays so close, doesn't stop touching her. Even though he knows. ...but does he? Any more than Scott? And should she actually say, do, something about that? But the surprise caught in her teeth only lets her ask one. ]
How?
[ Or is it why. ]
no subject
even here, even with this other jean, a jean of another world, another timeline, something — maybe from what he's fixed or someplace else altogether, because the jean he'd met before is gone — what he feels doesn't change.
still, her question is a heavy one, his eyes somber as he tries to find an answer, even if answers aren't typically what he's equipped for. he realizes the only thing he can provide is explaining it another way. ]
I ... I killed you, Jean.
[ does she know that? does she feel that? the way he can still remember the wet warmth of her blood over his knuckles? it's so different from the heat of her skin against his palm now. he swallows. ]
I was the only one who could go up against the Phoenix. So I was there — at the end. And I ... I just never let go.
[ and maybe that's why he'd still been there with her. or her with him. ]
no subject
The question he asks—doesn't ask—that she hears anyway—isn't an answer he'd like—he's ready for. But he was tangled up in trying to answer her question, and it was too big a question. (How many of hers aren't anymore?) Even for her, sometimes The White Room and the edges of The Phoenix were still bigger and broader than the scope of the human mind. (It was back there, changing behind her still, too.)
There's a faint breath out her nose at those last words.
Because if there were truer words about Logan,
she might not know them.
Because he never does. ]
You must not have. [ She has to wonder what that says about his Jean—Scott's—theirs—too. It's a different ripple of domino choices, but not a wrinkle. She doesn't know how all of it fits, but she can at least give him something she does know. ] The Phoenix returns to The White Hot Room to heal and collect its— [ Their; Her. ] —shattered pieces.
She must love you a great deal. [ Whether he knows it or not. ]