trans_9 | (no subject)

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Throughout the ship, people would hear the familiar voice of Stacy in their heads.

||Pod Release Protocols Initating||

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

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

Pop. Poppop. KASCHUNKhiiiiiissss.

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Nathan staggered around, and his surroundings swum a little.

"What... what the hell did you just do to me?" He glanced back at over at the woman, and fell over to the floor. "Just... just want some damn answers."

||I have given you a mild sedative. I have been answering your inquiries to the best of my ability.||

Great, drugged. If she wasn't with the Company, it definitely felt familiar. He blinked a few times, felt like everything had slowed down.

"What do you want with us?" Had to know of his ability then.

||You have been Chosen. You and others like you have been brought here to accomplish great things.||

Chosen? Which means yet another talk about destiny by the sound of it.

"Chosen for what? Or is that classified too?"

Survey says...

||Information classified.||

Sleepy grumble from the ex-Congressman.

".....Figures. All right, what can you tell us about being brought here?"

||You were taken, and placed into podsleep so proper life support could be provided until such time that it was necessary to have you released.||

"What about our clothes? Belongings?" Keeping it simple since the reason behind being taken was classified, and likely along with a lot of other explanations.

"And where are we?"

||Clothing will be provided in the Clothing Room. Standard authorization belongings will be stored in the Weapons and Possessions Lockers. You are currently in the Pod Caverns.||

Good, now we're getting somewhere. Another glance over at the woman before Nathan asked, "Fine, so where's the Clothing Room?"

A trail of pustules along the ground begin to glow, leading off into the distance.

||This way, please.||

Not gonna ask, don't want to know.

"You coming or what?" He asked the woman before he started to walk along the lit up path.

Once the man--Lacaille had mentally dubbed him "Mirzam"-- had started going on about this "Company" of his, she'd tried once or twice to speak up and tell him that this probably wasn't what he thought it was. Once he'd started threatening violence, she'd quietly moved off a bit to examine the chrysalis mechanism she'd emerged from, figuring she'd let him and the... intelligence they were communicating with work things out.

That wasn't to say she hadn't been paying attention (all right, she hadn't, mostly, though the intelligence was hard to ignore), but she'd ended up so absorbed in her examination that she jumped a bit when Mirzam called over to her. "Oh, sorry," she said, having the grace to sound a little sheepish. She rose from the crouching position she'd settled into and headed over towards him... then proceeded to get sidetracked by the path. "Are those bioluminescent?"

"Maybe? Right now I just care that they work, and we're getting some clothing." He'll reconsider it once he learns what kind it is, but for now he just didn't want to be coated in slime and naked.

He stumbled a little as they walked, the sedative slowing his normal fast strides.

"Clothing. Right." It didn't sound like it was all that much of a concern for her, but she followed along anyway--it wasn't as if she had anywhere else to go, and... oh, right, there was that whole taboo thing.

She picked up her pace a little to catch up with him, stumbling once or twice herself; she'd been neglecting her exercises lately, and it'd been a while since she'd last done any walking. "So, where are you from? And what's that company you were asking about?"

"Originally? New York, but last place I was in Odessa Texas before waking up here. The Company, they've kidnapped people before and held them. This looks pretty advanced to be one of their facilities though." Unless somebody has the ability to create organic ships.

"New York? That sounds kind of familiar..." She scans through her mental database, and it takes her a few seconds to come up with a match. "You mean you're from Earth?" She seems inordinately excited by this revelation, and goes right back to asking questions. "What's it like out there? Martel used to tell stories about his trips down there, but it was all just politics and economics and nothing about the biosphere or anything really interesting. I mean, I've read about it a little, of course, but that's not the same as hearing it from someone who lives there."

He was still walking along, but Nathan glanced back at her with clear surprise.

"Of course I'm from Earth, where else would I be from? Where the hell are you from?"

Now it was Lacaille's turn to be surprised, and the jar to her thought processes made her stumble a bit again. "Me? I'm space-born, so I'm not technically a citizen of anywhere, but the Messier's usually out in the Kuiper belt, so I guess you could say I'm 'from' there."

She tilted her head slightly and gave him a curious look. "You don't know about the rest of colonized space? I didn't think Earth was that isolated. Unless... but that's--not impossible, I guess, but not likely..." She trailed off, but she was starting to put two and two together.

Space-born? What the hell? She claiming to be an alien. No, mentioned something about colonies.

He shook his head, "We got some satellites and probes and the International Space Station in orbit right now. And that Hubble telescope, that's all. What's not likely?"

"Hubble? That was launched back in the Common Era, in 1990, and decommed in 2014 when they launched the Webb..."

She fell silent for a moment, pondering the implications of this. "I think... I think that one or both of us may have traveled in time. Liu and Virtanen disproved the possibility of closed timelike curves in 142, so we'd have been moved forward, possibly via travel at relativistic speeds. Or we may have been put into suspended animation, which would explain the purpose of the pods, but neither theory explains how we got here in the first place..."

More blinking, "Wait, time travel? Like Hiro? It was 2007 where I was. March 20th. You're saying we're in the what distant future now?"

"It was January 2, Aevum Astrorum 342 when I was--that corresponds to Common Era 2541--but I haven't seen any solid evidence about when we are now. All this is more advanced than anything I've ever seen, so--"

Right about then, another penny dropped. "You have time travel capabilities in your time?"

Right... years that went right over his head. Least until she mentioned 2541....that part he got, and jesus... way, way after his time or anybody else's from his world. Well except for maybe Adam if Hiro didn't get rid of him and his own daughter, Claire possibly. Maybe even Peter. They might still be around.

He nodded, "Yeah, sort of. I know a guy who can."