acatalepsy_logs | ( world #2

( world #2 - the storm. )

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a storm approaches.This log is for everyone who signed up for The Storm investigation. Feel free to use the here to plot further on how you plan on approaching The Storm, and the issue. The mod questions thread is also open, if you have anything you would like to run by us.

the investigation.

It takes a day of preparation, and a day of discussion, before you are led further down into the tunnels. It's pitch black, but one of the BGs who you have become familiar enough with turns on a low light and continues further. You walk for ten, fifteen, twenty minutes, and then turn a corner into a large, open cavern. The BG explains that at one time, this had been an underground transportation system - old and unused for centuries, now, but still in working order.

They file each of you onto a single car - it seems to be large enough to fit nearly a hundred, possibly more, bodies - so everyone has a space. The BG explains that they have already input the coordinates into the system, and that once they close the door, you will be transported to the last known location. The car will be programmed to wait for 72 hours, and then will return to this location. There is food and water supplied, and already packed, in the car. If you are not back in the car by that time, it will leave you behind. They then give their farewells, thank you for your help and readiness, and step away from the door - letting it close behind them. The car travels down a pitch black tunnel, and while the inside is dimly lit enough for the Circle Members to see each other and move around without hinderance, you can see nothing through the windows. It continues for a few hours at this rate - nothing to see, no idea where you are going. That is, until it seems to break through the surface, the track running through buildings and another, unknown area of the city.

The streets and buildings are abandoned, the tech old and outdated, windows broken out and dust filling the street. The sky, like back in the city you knew before, is cloudy and grey. But these clouds are different - these clouds are dark in a way you haven't seen before. You travel for another half hour above ground before the cart comes to a stop, and during this time it happens twice. A low rumble, seeming to come from everywhere at once, and then a few heartbeats after, a disasterous flash of lighting - miles away, yes, but threatening and gigantic, brighter and more violent than you've ever seen lightning before. The crash shakes the ground under you, and the damage is immense.

But the buildings are abandoned, the streets empty save for crates, old mechanical bits, dusty remnants of a society long forgotten by the Struxta you came from just a couple of days prior.

This is The Storm you've been warned about.

the storm.

You have been asked to find out information that will help the BG's, and Struxta, to stop The Storm.

From what you can gather, it does seem to be a naturally occurring weather phenomenon, as far as weather systems seem to work on this planet. However, rather than scattered thunder and lightning strikes, it seems to almost recharge and strike with epic proportions. It can damage, or destroy, buildings. It shorts out any and all items (and people) who depend on electricity in any form to function (Sorry Daylight and Conner, sorry to anyone who brought along technology) within a three mile radius.

The 'darkness' the BGs were talking about does follow this storm, but they seem to have been referring to this electrical shortage that comes from the storm and it's strikes. If this storm does reach any of the still-occupied areas of the city, it will shut down the entire grid, as well as any of the robots, androids, or electrically based figures that exist there - essentially ending the life of every Struxta citizen that is effected.

Plot, plan, theorize, and see if you can find a way to stop The Storm. If not, be back on the train car in 72 hours time, to return to the BGs and report what you have found.
PROMPT IDEAS
1.) Discussions on the train - do you have any ideas for what to prepare? Any discussions you may want to have? You and your fellow Circle Members are caught here together for a few hours, driving into a situation you know very little about. What do you want to make sure you're prepared to handle?

2.) Scouting missions - the heart of The Storm is very much in the distance, and it is not moving quickly, giving Circle Members plenty of time to set out and check out the surrounding city. What you will find won't be much - this is a robotic ghost town in every turn of the phrase. Buildings have been abandoned for hundreds of years, covered in dust and left entirely undisturbed, except for the breeze that now seems to flit through this entire area. There are stores, warehouses, apartments, and buildings you can't even tell what they were used for, cleared out. Whenever, or whoever, lived in this part of Struxta had evacuated, quickly but efficiently.

3.) The Storm - The Storm is still a distance away from where the cart has dropped you off, enough that when your 72 hours are up, the heart of the storm and the lightning strikes shouldn't reach the car, or the track. This does mean that to do any closer investigation, you will need to go to The Storm itself. But be careful - the electrical output from these lightning strikes are dangerous, and can have all sorts of effects on both natural and mechanical beings. The wind, the closer you get to The Storm, will also pick up - making any kind of flying or air travel impossible.

4.) Planning - the car leaves everyone off at an old train station, which a large room attached. This room can be used as a kind of home base, as well as a meeting location. What do you plan on doing? Simply taking down information, or trying to take the storm head on? How do you plan on doing that? Will your abilities help? This room attached onto the train station is a safe location - no effects of The Storm will make it inside. Use as you would like!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Afraid.

[The answer comes unbidden, his inhibitions snapped due to the the shock of the Storm affecting him. Afraid, afraid of dying, that little grain of truth suddenly blossoming with all of its sharp edges, shattering through the surface of cognitive thought.]

Fear of dying.

[Hard to forget the look on the PL600 that day. Burned into memory.]

[ What a surprisingly human reaction, from someone who insists that he is only a machine. So simple a statement carries with it so much weight, suffocating in the sheer gravity of it, and Arenvald know this feeling all too well. It settled in his bones hungry night after hungry night spent on the streets of Ala Mhigo, curled in the darkness and pleading with whatever gods would listen while all the while he felt like he was wasting away. It took him by the heart and held fast while the halls of the Waking Sands were swarming with Imperial soldiers, the report of gunfire ricocheting off the walls, comrades and loved ones both left bleeding and broken on the stone floor.

Please, I don’t want to die. ]

You’re not going to die. I’m going to get you to safety Connor, I promise.

[How can he promise? How can he know? The Storm may explode again at a distance, pulsing through his core, stripping away every single line of programmed code, shredding memory, overloading actuators and stopping his Thirium pump. Maybe such a thing was happening now, and the scrambled warnings still flickering across his vision are trying to tell him just how long he has until he’s offline again.

What a hollowing thought. It’s the permanence that scares him. It’s the fact that he’s scared that scares him. It’s just like before, on that cold rooftop, snow stained blue. A secondhand experience now becoming firsthand.

Connor has nothing more to say, nothing to add, as Arenvald continues to carry him.]

[ The truth of the matter is, he doesn’t know. There’s no way he can know. All he can do is believe, believe and keep moving. He says he will get far enough away so that Connor can be safe, because failure is not an option he can accept. New as their friendship is, he refuses to add yet another name to the list of people he’s lost.

He checks in on Connor as they go, asking if he’s still with him, and holding his breath until he hears soft confirmation. The hike back to the train station feels like a lifetime, and every distant lightning strike sends a cold bolt of fear and worry down his spine, prompting the cycle to start all over again.

A quiet thank you to the gods escapes his lips when the station that has served as the Circle’s home base comes into view, and as weary as he is from having carried Connor who knows how far, the sight is enough to make him redouble his efforts. Sorry to any other Circle members who may be inside, as he lays into the door with his foot to force his way inside, crossing the dusty room to gingerly deposit his friend atop an old table, his back to the wall. ]

Oi, look at me. Are you all right?

[The farther away they get, the less the Storm affects him. Sometimes there’s a jolt to his system, another swath of static in a short burst, but it’s nothing like the first two times. Not remotely close.

It’s a blessing. It gives Connor time to detach himself from that spiked surge of hollow fear — attached to a memory that he wasn’t quite prepared to revisit — and time to properly realign all that had shifted and fragmented in his mind. Still shaken, LED transitioned from red to yellow, it’s the sound of the door being booted open that really brings him back to a state of awareness, beyond merely giving Arenvald the cursory answer when he’s spoken to.

Placed on the table, he leans against the wall; his limbs feel more workable, and he shifts, moving his palms against the flat surface to angle himself better to speak to his friend.

Though his eyes don’t quite meet his, not yet.]

I’m returning to a more functional state.

That's good to hear.

[ And it is, but there is not quite relief in Arenvald's voice. Connor is dodging his gaze, so he ducks a bit to try and get a better look at him. ]

But are you all right?

[Little choice but to meet his gaze now, the way Arenvald ducks down to seek it. Connor's lips thin, and he tries to straighten; after being carried half upside-down for quite a long way, he's in a vaguely disheveled state. Mussed hair and jacket settling slightly askew on his frame.]

I'm fine. [He forces something that sounds like stability into those words. Easier to do, now that his syllables don't run the chance of sounding garbled and far away, though it's still strained] Though not a particularly pleasant experience, I have you to thank for escorting me away from it. So... thank you.

[let's just not talk about it]

[ Connor is always so pristine, hair and everything just so. To see him looking a bit rough around the edges would usually be cause for amusement, and mayhap Arenvald will tease him about it later, but right now he is dealing with the very real fact that his friend nearly died. Possibly for good this time.

That thought strikes him like one of the lightning bolts still flashing in the distance, and he slings an arm around Connor’s shoulders, tugging him into a one-armed hug. ]

I’m… I’m really glad you’re okay.

[The embrace is sudden and unexpected. There's an obvious way that Connor stiffens, unsure what to do with the gesture; knowing that it is, by definition, Arenvald showing worry. Concern mixed with terrible relief, knowing that he's relatively safe now, and no longer at the mercy of those bolts of lightning shooting across the sky.

And for a moment, he wishes that this wasn't so— so difficult, all of it. That this simple hug shouldn’t come with a wide swath of options describing how to proceed, how he should act, if he should reciprocate, if doing so will show that sharp edge of emotion that keeps cutting through the surface of who he’s supposed to be, what he’s supposed to be.

Then it hits him. Strange, how androids aren’t supposed to feel tired. But there’s a weight in his body that he can’t describe, and whether it’s coming from his physical state being put through the wringer, all the mental uncertainties cropping up like weeds, or some coalescence of both, he can’t tell.

Connor leans in a little, and manages-]

I didn't mean to scare you.

Edited 2018-08-03 19:14 (UTC)

[ It occurs to him a moment too late that an android may be unused to hugs, and he feels a bit bad when he feels Connor go rigid. The poor guy has had more than his fair share of scares and harrowing circumstances today, Arenvald didn’t mean to add to it at all.

He is very close to pulling away, an apology already forming on his lips, when Connor rests some of his weight on him. The apology remains unspoken, cast aside and forgotten, as Arenvald flexes his fingers against Connor’s shoulder. ]

It’s all right. We made it, didn’t we?

[The slowest drain of tension, only slight. Barely noticeable, so small that it means nothing in the grand scheme of things. But it's there still, and Connor sets his jaw, faintly nodding.]

Yes.

[A moment more passes, and then Connor straightens to look at Arenvald, appearing as if wishes to say something. Just on that precipice, words dangling on the barest thread, waiting for the string to be cut.

As always seems to be the case these days, he settles on something only part of the way there.]

I meant it, though, when I said I would be fine now. I just need time to process what's happened.

[Literally process, lining up misplaced fragments back into neat little rows in his mind. And process process, compartmentalizing away what was felt and experienced.]

[ He pulls his arm away as Connor straightens, allowing him to sit up fully.

There is… something in Connor’s expression, something rife with hesitation and expectation both, and he finds that the words that do come out don’t quite match. But then, that’s sort of what Connor does. ]

Do you want to talk about it? I find that helps.

[There's an even longer moment of consideration, and it would be easy to assume that Connor had taken a step away from that ledge, feeling no need to test the depth of the waters below.

But then, with a strange sense of renewed fervency-] What I told you before... about death. [How he still dances around the term 'fear'.] Will you please put it from your mind?

[ Okay, that’s… not what he expected to come out of this conversation. ]

What? Why?

Because it’s not something I’m supposed to say. It’s evidence of compounding errors in my system and I—

[He doesn’t want to think about it. Doesn’t want to deal with it. Wants to just pretend it never happened, wrap it up and throw it away.]

Think it would be best to consider it as an outlier of a response, brought on by extenuating circumstances.

… There’s nothing wrong with fear, Connor. It happens to all of us.

[ He still doesn’t fully understand what Connor sees to be hard barriers, lines he should not cross, because doing so would deviate from his original programming. He sees a friend struggling with the things he had felt – might still be feeling, even – and wants to help him.

Pretending it never happened is not going to help him. ]

[Well that’s exactly what he intends to do, Arenvald.]

No. It doesn’t happen to me.

[He shifts where he’s seated, unsure what to do with his hands as his mind works. Wishes he could fiddle with his quarter.]

It can’t. It’s indicative of something very wrong with me, Arenvald. An android cannot deviate from how they were programmed to be — and fear is not something I can experience.

But it does happen to you. It did, more than once.

[ Again, he'd said. I felt it again. ]

Connor, what if nothing is wrong with you? What if... what if you are simply meant to be more than your program?

No. I’m not supposed to be more than what I was designed for.

[Arenvald was right in his assessment though — the “again” was a thoughtless slip, but accurate.]

Even entertaining a thought like that is dangerous. Androids like that are dangerous.

Why? What makes them any more dangerous than anyone else who has ever felt fear?

[ Gods, what a time for his Echo to be stripped away. He just wants to understand, and a glimpse into Connor's life would be more than helpful.

But then, it's never been a reliable gift anyway. Even if he did still have it, it would probably choose to show him nothing. ]

It isn’t only fear. It’s everything.

[That cascade of exponential errors that stack on top of each other, until they become a pillar of something impossible to ignore — the confusion and sensation of false emotion.]

I worked cases revolving around androids who... “snapped”, who under various stressors strayed from their core programming and became dangerous in their unpredictability. In my world, we call them deviants.

You've told me that before, and I still don't get it.

[ He makes a motion with his hand, towards the open station door, to the wastes and the raging Storm beyond. ]

Back there, you weren't dangerous. You were just scared.

I know, but what I’m trying to say this time is...

[Arenvald, why can’t you just drop it. Why does he have to give the play-by-play, something he doesn’t usually mind doing, but now it feels like each word is a heavy stone wrenched from his mouth-]

My purpose becomes null and void, if I begin showing these same signs.

Because you're supposed to investigate deviants, you can't become one yourself, is that it?

[ There is a pause then, where he watches Connor closely. He should probably just drop it, he knows that, but he would much rather help Connor understand what he's been through that forget about it. ]

Does that thought scare you? That you might be like one of them?

[He had just asked to discard the notion of him being afraid. Now that Arenvald is bringing up the idea once more, albeit of a different sort, it’s almost visible how quickly Connor decides to just completely abandon this line of questioning.

He scoots forward, in an attempt to plant his feet on the ground and stand.]

No. I only find it regrettable that it’ll prove detrimental going forth, if I’m ever to return home.

[Managing to stand, but with one hand still tellingly leaning against the metal table, he continues-]

In the meanwhile, I’ll simply attempt to self-correct.

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