Podpop

[cityship]

[ooc: Newbie Helpers List | Instructions: Post your character with one post establishing them as being podpopped. Tag each other in groups of 2's, 3's, and 4's, to get some interaction to start with. If a thread doesn't already have 2 or 3 people tagged in, tag it with your character's podpop popping near the other people, rather than making a new subthread. If you would like to play out them talking to the AI, please send an email to the mods making the request--we do this only by request. Then move onto the big Newbie Meeting. Once your character has gotten the rundown from the old crew, you may start posting entrance posts and freely tagging.]


||Pod Release Protocols Initating|| Stacy's familiar voice sounds out to all the podmates through the ship.

In the Pod Caverns, there are the sounds of: Pop. Pop pop pop. Poppuhpoppoppop. KASCHUNKhiiiiiiiissssss.

There is condensation and mist spraying out from cracks in the pods, as the people inside slide out onto the floors, covered in slime.

--

There was nothing. You were going about your normal life, then there was a bright light, and then? Nothing.

Then the world lurches.

The chamber here is humid.

Actually, "chamber" isn't quite accurate. You're in a cavern, half-lit by an eerie greenish light, going on and on as far as the eye can see. The light is coming from what can only be described as pods, glistening, round greenish-yellow things, glowing with a pale inner light, outlining human -- and not quite human -- forms. Each is rooted to the floor, to the walls, with something black, twisted, and unidentifiable.

They line the walls of the cavern, go up in maddeningly high columns, curling and corkscrewing up into the darkness, until the light from them is like that of the stars, glowing pale and mournful in clusters in the darkness above. Twisted walkways and stairs crisscross, traverse the platforms in front of the pods, wending their way back and forth, up and down through the chamber.

You just came from one of those pods, broke free like a butterfly from a (slimy, nasty) chrysalis.

Now you stand alone but not quite alone, naked, not knowing how you got there, who took you, or why you were taken.

As your body heats up again, you realize the air is warm -- just a few degrees too warm to be comfortable -- and muggy; it smells acrid and organic, like freshly spilt blood and sweat. Your mouth tastes of salt.

The floors are pulsing under your feet, throbbing...

Wherever you are, this entire place...is alive.

Oh, and also you're naked and covered in alien snot.

When you call out, ask where you are, a voice speaks to you, in your head. She tells you:

||You are here.||

When you ask who she is, she tells you that her name is STA'C K'LTRRB'TXFT, but that you may call her Stacy. When she tells you who she is, there is a gush of emotion, love, maternal warmth. You are on a ship. She is that ship. Her name is Stacy and she loves you. Her voice is warm and motherly, even if these messages sound almost automated.

Glowing phosphorescent lights appear in pustules along the floor. They lead you up a massive spiraling walkway that gives you a view of what are possibly millions in stasis. At the top is a room with moving vines that clean you and clothe you in a plant-like body-suit--soft, but durable. After that, the lights lead you to a great cavernous room with a clear floor that lets you see all the holes and tunnels in the walls of it. When you reach the center, the last thing she tells you before whisking you away to gather your belongings and meet the rest of the crew is this reassuring thought:

||You have been Chosen to accomplish a Great Purpose. You have been Chosen to help fight the Ohm, a race of insectoid beings that are the destroyers of worlds.||

||You have been Chosen as champions of life, as protectors of the worlds and peoples that are left. The others are waiting for you. They will explain everything.||

She will tell you nothing more. Your answers lie with these "others" she speaks of.

Comments

[ternaui.livejournal.com]

The big scaly muscles tremble just a little, but the Chancellor breathes and nods.

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

"Damn it!" Hitting the pod again for good measure, Snow stepped back. "Nothing."

But despite finding no alternatives, he didn't move.

[prettycoolguy]

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," said a third voice. It was low and rough, a voice that wasn't used much.

Its owner was a tall man, near seven feet, with brown hair and a solid jaw. He was pale, and rather heavily scarred in a way that was perhaps not reassuring.

He didn't seem to be spoiling for a fight, at least.

[ternaui.livejournal.com]

Scarred human men are reasonably reassuring to The Chancellor, but this isn't one of his. He looks at the human intently, waiting for an explanation. Their efforts have not been effective so far, but if Veronica is there, he has no intention of letting her down.

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

"And why not?" he asked back, brow furrowing and looking none to pleased at that idea.

"I've got people I need to find in here."

[prettycoolguy]

"It won't work," the Chief replied. "Trust me. I've been here for-" he hesitated briefly to remember, "at least a year," he finished.

"Those don't open unless Stacy wants them open, and she'll stop you if you try."

[ternaui.livejournal.com]

The human seems believable. The Chancellor can't help setting his hand on the pod anxiously, though. His little girl might be in there.

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

"Then she can try. I'm not going to stop and leave my friends in here just because some fal'Cie I'm hearing in my head is telling me to."

He clenched a fist, growing impatient and worried.

[prettycoolguy]

"They're safer in the pods than they are out here, honestly," he said.

"Besides, there are millions of pods. How do you know that's even who you're looking for?"

The Chief knew it was probably going to be tough to convince them. People always worried about their families and friends, and things as he was fairly sure they were didn't stack up all that well on the comforting scale.

[ternaui.livejournal.com]

...The Chancellor believes he understand what is going on now. Air hisses through many clenched pointy teeth, the closest he can make to a sound.

Hostages. Just like the Saernai, this ship was keeping hostages, their safety based on the operative-prisoners' 'good behavior.'

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

"I'm not the only one here with people I want to save." And to make that point clear, he motioned toward the Chancellor. "We'll just open them all up so this guy and anybody else can find who they're looking for."

Yep. Snow was going to be a tough one to reason with.

[prettycoolguy]

"At least come up to the Obs Deck and meet the crew. They're better at explaining things than I am," he said. He hoped they'd take it, he wasn't exactly the best at this by any stretch. Matt would've been a much more ideal person for the job.

"They'll all be down here if you decide to come back."

[ternaui.livejournal.com]

There's a long pause as the Chancellor's hands still press to the pod.

Then, every muscle trembles with struggling self discipline as he stands and steps away from it, straightening.

One more silent snarl as he makes himself walk away from the pod.

'Follow the lights.' He knows how that game is played. Unoriginal as always, the enemy was.

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

Snow crossed his arms.

"And how do I know I'll be allowed to come back?" One thing he wasn't looking forward to was being tricked, and then restricted from coming back to the place where he was completely convinced Serah and the rest of his friends were if they weren't awake with him. Because then instead of pods he'd just be hitting the entrance to the caverns.

[prettycoolguy]

He had to get this guy to budge. It just wasn't right to leave somebody down here in the pod caverns on their own doing god knew what.

"What would prove it to you?" he said.

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

"Not much," he admitted.

"Look, I'm not leaving without her. They'll have to drag me outta here if they want me out that badly."

Fortunately for Snow that would happen soon enough at this rate. Or eventually he'd actually find who he was looking for.

[prettycoolguy]

"It's not worth it. If they're not in the ship's schedule for release, they don't come out. That's how it works. We don't like it, but that's the facts."

This was going well.
Not at all.

"I know, I'm a stranger. Call me Chief, everyone else does. I'm... or at least I was co-head of Ship Security."

He offered Snow a hand to shake. It was the best he could do as far as a gesture of good faith.

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

And Snow was one to appreciate good faith, so with a small nod, he briefly took Chief's hand in greeting. "Snow Villiers."

Unfortunately even great faith wasn't something to convince Snow to just stop looking inside the pods. So he leaned back some with a small smile after that. "I appreciate the advice, Chief, but I already lost her like this once already. I'm not about to let it happen again. Especially when it's not just her this time."

And then he figured he'd add, just to maybe ensure the guy (even though Snow figured his determination would be his own problem if something bad happened). "But I'll be careful. I made it this far, didn't I?"

[prettycoolguy]

"No offense, but making it out of the pod's not hard."

He had to get up to the Obs deck. There was work to be done.

"I'm going up. Tell you what, kid. I'll send someone down to check on you in a bit."

And maybe talk sense into him, he privately added to himself.

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

"I did a lot before I woke up here! And thanks, but you don't have to do that. I'll be up after I'm done with what I'm doing." Since for Snow, it was something that was going to be done. "Promise."

[willnotleaveyou.livejournal.com]

As if hearing that last word, a nearby pod began to rupture.

Unceremoniously, a small rose-haired girl slid onto the floor, not entirely awake yet. How many times does a girl have to wake up from stasis, anyway?

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

No matter who the newly-released crew-member was, Snow would have made sure to check up on them, make sure they were okay. It wasn't like he had all of the post-podpopping experience in the multiverse, but a little while was still better than nothing, wasn't it?

"--uh oh," he muttered when he heard the kshh kshh of the pod as it opened. And it was pretty hard to really make out a face through the ... whatever that slime was in those pods. But when he took a step forward, there was something about the hair ... and the height compared to him almost seemed as if--

His eyes went wide, and for a moment he froze, almost as if this was some sort of joke. A trick by what he still thought could very well be the fal'Cie that spoke to him when he woke up. Serah.

"Serah?!"

[willnotleaveyou.livejournal.com]

A combination of the voice in her head and the voice by her side woke her from her slimy slumber. One she recognized, and one that was foreign. Very foreign.

She blinked the goo from her eyes as the strange voice told its even stranger story inside her head. Why did it sound so comforting? Where was it coming from?

These questions became momentarily irrelevant when her vision cleared and she saw her beloved fiance. "Snow?"

[coldhardfisting.livejournal.com]

Suddenly, attempting to beat the crap out of unopened pods didn't matter anymore. Nor did the dragon he just met, or the guy who tried to convince him to come up to the Obs Deck.

"Serah!"

For this one moment absolutely nothing else mattered as, like a bullet, Snow was over and kneeling on the ground and who gave a flying fuck that they were in a chamber full of pods, naked, covered in slime with hardly any idea where exactly they were and all of the reasons why they were there. All that mattered to him was that Serah was there with him. And though Snow had done a pretty good job of cleaning himself off after he woke up, he had no qualms at all with pulling her into a tight hug. She might have been disoriented and confused. But if she heard that same voice that he had, he wanted to make sure that despite any and all of those feelings, she felt something safe and familiar.

[ternaui.livejournal.com]

And the Chancellor turned back at the noise, and smiled, and prayed his Veronica was somehow safe, too.