quest selected: glad to be unhappy [open; backdated options]

[quixotically]

Who: Elle (Courier Six) and YOU
Where: Anywhere you want, though these are specific locations that'll be popping up: Hydroponics, the Garibah Tree, the Public Bathroom in the City, and a wall near the Level 5 Sleeping Halls teleporter. And, for the sake of narration, the Lucky 38. The Drunken Dragon Tavern will be added later!
When: Any time ranging from shortly after the podpops to the past week or so.
Summary: Elle has been occupying herself by exploring the ship, especially the City. I'm going to set this post up in a bit of a weird way, with the OP being a general exploring post, and then threads for specific locations, just to make things clean and easily organized. Feel free to tag into any of the threads unless it's marked as [CLOSED], and you can start your own thread with Elle set in another location of your choosing if you'd like! These settings are just starting points, in a way.
Warnings: None?

Elle is certain there are better things she could be doing, but... Unbeknownst to her, spending an endless amount of time exploring the Ship and its City has become her coping mechanism. She hasn't quite realized just how hard this whole situation has hit her. The knowledge that her home, the world she had learned to love again, even after everything that happened there, was gone... Knowing that most of the people she'd met probably hadn't been saved... Maybe she's still in shock. Maybe she's subconsciously delaying the information from truly, fully sinking in. But, regardless, she thinks she's fine. Which is why she wonders why she's still doing it. But everything else in her mind is telling her to keep poking her head around, and she's learned to listen to her instincts, so... Exploring it is.

Elle has managed to get herself a dress made a few weeks after her podpop, at the very least. There's a part of her that feels particularly naked without her combat armor, but she doesn't want to run around the ship wearing it -- it makes her seem more heavily armed, and that's not exactly good for making friends. Her dress and her Pre-War Hat will do her just fine, thank you very much, and it's much more comfortable. (Of course, she still has her shotgun slung over her back and a bag filled with extra ammo and her teddy bear over her shoulder. She may not be wearing her armor, but at least she'll be able to fight.)

The small Courier can be found everywhere publicly accessible on the Ship, though it's much more common to find her somewhere in the City. There's a lot more to distract herself with explore there, after all.

Comments

[ hydroponics ]

[quixotically]

Elle has never seen so much plantlife. Everywhere she looks, it's green, green, green, and flowers of every imaginable color, shape, and size, and it's all just so alive and thriving... When she first steps into Hydroponics, she can't help but stand there (despite being in the way), eyes wide with shock and awe as she tries to process it all. The air is rich and clean and filled with rustling and animal calls. Distantly, she's reminded of when she first entered the New Vegas Strip. She had thought then that she had never seen anything so wonderful in her entire life. This place, though... It puts the Strip to shame. She still misses the bright lights and radio music in the air, but Hydroponics doesn't need it. The flowers are its bright lights, the whispers of plants and murmurs of animals are its music. It is truly beautiful.

Elle can be found idly wandering Hydroponics, staring at everything around her. Her expression is a mixture of near-worship and concern that something will jump out and eat her.

At some point, she can also be found stalking a stilt glider. She doesn't seem to be trying to catch it or hurt it, she's just... following it, watching it. She seems extremely intent about the whole thing, which may look a bit strange, considering how bright and excited her eyes are.

[elementofloyalty]

"Hey! HEEEEY!"

Someone's calling out to her. But oddly enough, the voice seems to be coming from above her.

Because that's where Rainbow Dash is hovering, looking irritated.

[quixotically]

... wha --

Oh. It's one of those talking flying ponies she was warned about. It -- she? -- doesn't seem all that happy about something, though.

"Yes?" she asks, using her polite and friendly tone.

bendytimed before her mission!

[farseer_alastirra]

It was fairly normal to see the Draenei working on her garden--who could miss nearly seven feet worth of purple alien lady, anyway?

The garden itself is maybe fifteen to twenty feet square, and a good half of it is full to bursting with plants--mostly food plants, to be precise. There are what look like corn stalks, bean vines, berry bushes, and outside the stones that line one side of the garden itself, what definitely look like tea plants. The rest of it is plant stubble, which the shaman is hacking at with a hoe as she endeavors to turn the earth and prepare it for yet another planting.

To one side, beneath a tree, lays a rather large white feline with faint gray spots. It has a saddle of sorts, though its eyes are quite clearly closed and its sides rise and fall in the rhythm of sleep.

Pausing at her hoeing, the female gave a friendly wave to the unfamiliar girl. "Hello!"

[quixotically]

Supermutant? Elle thinks automatically, but she quickly pushes the assumption aside. She needs to get better at not doing that.

"Hello." Elle waves back as she inspects where the not-supermutant is working. Something in her itches to get a better look. "That's a lovely garden."

[bequiet_hescreamed]

Clef's garden is neither as large nor as widely varied as Draenei's, being comprised of several plants he acquired during shore leaves, and all of them still small. Not that he minds - he gets at least as much pleasure just from the act of caring for the plants as from having anything to show for it. Indeed, the plants look well cared-for - loved, even.

He was kneeling in their midst, wearing a loose-fitting tunic and trousers in an almost-but-not-quite medieval style. As much as he hated to get one of his only actual sets of clothing dirty, there wasn't any helping it - his plantsuit was still being cleaned after his last mission. The only thing to do was wear clothing and gather it all up above his knees and elbows, which is exactly what he did. It might've looked a bit silly, having all of this fabric to cover so little, but he was un-self-consciously engrossed in pulling weeds (to consume later, as many of them were edible) and making sure his tiny garden was well enough irrigated and fed.

What he saw when he happened to look up was a brightly-colored, insectile lizard picking its way through the dense vegetation surrounding the garden, followed by... a pair of eyes. Certainly, those eyes were part of a face which in turn was on a head attached to a body. But mostly there were bright, wonder-filled eyes, and it took him a moment to adjust to the fact that these eyes did not seem to belong to anyone younger than five. When he did, he smiled.

He wasn't sure if he should say anything, though. Elle seemed busy.

[quixotically]

Elle, admittedly, isn't paying great attention to where she's going, just enough to keep her from tripping over things in her path. She wants to get a better look at that animal, and a better one, and she's honestly tempted to catch it and try keeping it as a pet, but she doesn't know if that kind of thing is even allowed. Or what it eats. Or, you know, anything practical like that. Still, maybe if she follows it, she'll be able to learn more about it, so that if she finds out she can keep it as a pet, then she'll know what to do --

She manages to catch herself before she stumbles into a garden. She takes a moment to get a look at it, mostly to know the size of it so she can move around it before she loses track of the animal, but then she gets distracted by the familiar person tending to it.

"Oh... Sorry!" She smiles sheepishly. "I didn't mean... I was just..." She looks up. The animal seems to have gotten away. Drat.

Forever late

[grimbiker]

When Sirius first woke on the meatship he practically lived in Hydroponics. At first it was overwhelming. He had spent too long trapped in a cell. There was no green at Azkaban. It was all grey- even the food.

He recognized the look of awe on Elle's face.

"Breathtaking, isn't it?" Sirius sauntered over as he spoke, hands in his pockets, and also looking around.

'sokay, I'm always late too :3

[quixotically]

Elle has been so distracted by the scenery that she hasn't been looking out for people around her. When someone speaks to her, she startles guiltily. How careless of me. I should be paying more attention. She offers the stranger an apologetic smile.

"It's like nothing I've ever seen," she admits, still a little sheepish.

[ the garibah tree ]

[quixotically]

In the midst of all these buildings and houses, there is a clearing, and in that clearing, there is a great tree. It's blue, which would strike Elle as odd if she wasn't standing in a living, breathing ship. She's never seen a tree like it before, though, so she approaches it anyway, curious as ever.

There's... something about it, and she slowly walks towards its trunk, craning her neck to look up. It stretches high above her. Cautiously, she reaches out and touches its trunk with the tips of her fingers. "You really are special, aren't you?" she murmurs, moving forward enough to press her palm against the tree. She can feel it, whatever it is. She doesn't know how to describe it, other than definitely there.

Well... This certainly seems as good a place as any to take a rest. She turns around and sits down at the base of the tree, leaning back against its trunk. She's about to close her eyes and relax when she spots something. She turns her head to find... a thing. What in the world?

Re: [ the garibah tree ]

[starbolts]

Someone else is just as puzzled by it. A floating girl is staring in wonder, looking for the small creatures that may have considered it home.

"Are you a birdkeeper?" Starfire asks the unfamiliar person. It would be something new if she was! There had been one bird before, one she misses along with his owner, but imagine a collection of them!

[quixotically]

There's a... floating... girl. Distantly, Elle hopes that she's using some kind of science she hasn't heard of to do that whole floating thing, instead of magic, like Morgan had told her about. Her brain is not ready to wrap around magic yet.

"No," Elle answers, wondering where the question came from. "Why?"

Re: [ the garibah tree ]

[mynameisax]

Ax stepped out onto the grass, still somewhat absorbed in calculating the lengths of wire he'd need for his current project. He missed Earth at times like this -- there, there had been dumps and Radio Shacks full of things he could cannibalize for parts.

One of his stalk-eyes fixed on an apparent-human sitting at the base of the tree, staring in confusion at the bird perch nearby. He ought to move that, at least while Tobias remained in the Pods. It wouldn't do to leave the grass crushed for no reason.

He dropped his omnicom into the sling he wore to carry things in, and moved forward, nodding in greeting to the human at the base of the tree.

[quixotically]

... what in the world is that?

Elle can't help it; she doesn't mean to be rude, but she winds up staring anyway. Blue... deer-man... with eye-antennae and no mouth and a bladed radscorpion tail?

Luckily, it only takes a moment before she manages to shake off her surprise. Whatever it is, it -- he? -- gestured to her, and she should be polite. She offers him(?) a small, friendly smile and returns the nod.

[ the public bathroom ]

[quixotically]

Bathrooms are always places prospectors should investigate, Elle has learned. For one thing... they're bathrooms, but for another, there is almost always something useful to scavenge there. So when she finds something that seems to look like a bathroom, she doesn't hesitate to turn right into it.

... except then she stops and stares.

Maybe this wouldn't surprise her nearly as much if it didn't look like a normal bathroom. Part of the shock comes simply from finding something normal on the Ship, something familiar. But the majority of it is born from the fact that it's clean. Never in her life has Elle ever seen a clean bathroom. Or a clean... anything, really. Even the nicest establishments in the Mojave are run down, the walls crumbling, areas of the floor broken up or cracked at best, water damage... and not to mention that most everything is coated in a fine layer of dust or sand.

But this... This bathroom is... clean.

Cautiously, uncertainly, Elle slowly pushes open one of the stall doors. ... and she stares then, too. The toilet bowl is whole? Not broken? And it has a full seat?

Buh.

[on_your_nerves]

There was a man that entered the bathroom behind her. He was wearing a suit and had leather shoulder bag that he was carrying around with him. For a moment, after he entered, he spent a moment just standing there, looking around at the bathroom, almost as if she wasn't there.

[thisclinchesit]

A few stalls down, there's the trademark noise of sucking and rushing water that echoes through the room when a toilet flushes. A few moments later, a well-dressed man steps out from the stall, and glancing to the side, he kind of just...stares at Elle for a moment. It's a moment of déjà vu of sorts...

[ level 5 sleeping halls ]

[quixotically]

As soon as Elle heard about the teleportation feature, she immediately sought out a way to get her Omnicomm upgraded for it. It's simply useful, and anything that's useful, she wants it. Call it a pack rat mentality, Elle calls it practicality. She was warned that sometimes it malfunctions, but she figured that it wasn't anything she couldn't handle.

Until she tried to teleport to the Sleeping Halls and found herself... stuck in a wall? Is that really what's happening here? That's the conclusion she's reached, though she's not entirely sure about what's going on. But she can hear people moving and talking outside, she can feel Stacy's heartbeat... and she can't see anything except for the glow of her Pip-Boy. Honestly, she's surprised she can breathe if she really is stuck in a wall. Though, it is difficult, considering the tight space she has somehow been crammed into...

"Hello?" she tries calling out. She doesn't have enough room to try banging on the walls... of the wall... so shouting will just have to do. She hopes it does, anyway. "Can anyone hear me?"

Re: [ level 5 sleeping halls ]

[anwei]

Anwei was still houseless, so she was sleeping in the bunks when she did sleep. She was again trying to choose a bunk in an area where she hadn't slept before - this manual randomization wasn't going to work forever, she really needed to write a program for it - when she heard a muffled voice.

Not from a bunk, though. From the wall beside her.

She put her hand against the warm, slightly pulsing wall and leaned close. "Yes, I can hear you. Are you in the mazes?" she half-shouted. That seemed to make the most sense, that GLaDOS' mazes might run between the walls here.

[ meeting Morgan's car | CLOSED ]

[quixotically]

It's not like Elle has anything else to do right at that moment, and Morgan seemed to be free right then and there, and she's extremely interested in seeing his car, so... "Why not now?" she had suggested.

Now she's following him through the Ship to wherever it is he keeps his car. Without any warning, something strikes her strange and alien about the whole situation, and it has nothing to do with walking around in an alien spaceship. It's more the whole "she's walking and talking with a nice guy and going to go check out Pre-War technology." ... except it isn't really Pre-War, probably. Maybe that's what's weird about it. Or, y'know, maybe it's because her subconscious is kicking her, trying to make her realize that he's been flirting with her. Not that it's working, since she's deciding to shrug the weird feeling off.

Sorry, Morgan.

"So, where are we going, exactly?" she asks casually, just to have something to talk about. "This place is huge..."

[morganknight]

"Not far," he said, cheerfully leading the way out of the Obs Deck proper. "I try to park far enough away that no one will crash, smash, or blunder into the car, or get confused by what it is because they're from a planet not so technologically-advanced as to recognize it."

[ the lucky 38 | CLOSED ]

[quixotically]

The City shifts suddenly into night. Wow... Talk about a short day. Luckily, Elle has her Pip-Boy, so she lifts her arm to turn the light on. When she looks up again, she catches a bright light in the corner of her eye. Reflexively, she turns her head, and

her heart stops.

She knows that shape. She knows that building. With a painful jolt, her heart twists in her chest and she loses her breath. Some small voice in the back of her head warns her that it might be something else, it may just be another building, she shouldn't get her heart set on it, but it's drowned out by the surge of emotions. Hope. Homesickness. Longing. Desperation. Before she knows it, she's running.

She will remember the trip between where she was and where she's going as a blur. Nothing else mattered then except getting there.

And she did. And she was right.

The Lucky 38 greets her with all of its flashing lights. Something inside her -- everything that has been bubbling under the surface ever since her podpop -- breaks. She's starting to cry as she pulls open one of the casino's doors.

Through bleary vision, she checks out the state of the 38. Power is all on. Elevator is working. The cocktail lounge has no alcohol, but plenty of glasses and empty bottles, though behind the bar, she finds two crates, one filled with Sunset Sasparilla and one with Nuka-Cola. None of the things she had stored in the Presidential Suite are there, but she can't say she's surprised. At least some of my decorations are still here, she thinks as she looks at the three pool balls sitting on the coffee table in her bedroom. She's still not sure why she decided to pick up a cue ball, an 8 ball, and a 13 ball and set them up in her room like this. It just feels right somehow, if a little sad. She wishes she could remember the importance behind it.

When she arrives on the Penthouse floor, she finds it more empty than ever. There are no Securitrons. There is no hum and beep of electronics. A dread begins to grow in the back of her head. Slowly, she walks towards the main room. The survivalist in the back of her mind tries to warn her, prepare her. Logic says, you know better, don't get your hopes up, be ready...

The side monitors displaying feeds from the security cameras in the Lucky 38 are operational. But the big screen in the middle...

Connection lost...

Elle sinks to the floor, then, and cries. It's a helpless sort of crying, the kind born from the scared, lost little girl inside her. She had thought, she had hoped, maybe, just maybe, he would be here, waiting for her, and he would scold her for taking so long, but then he would have all the answers and know just what to do, but he isn't. Finally, profoundly, Elle feels alone and small and powerless in this place, this living, breathing ship floating through space on a mission to save the universe, far away from anything familiar and right and any place she might have called home and any people she might have once called family. It's all gone, they're all gone, save for a girl and a dog who don't know who she is and the people from who are still sleeping inside their pods. She's scared. She wants to go home. This building may have been the place she called home, but it's still all wrong, sitting on meaty ground instead of dead and desolate. She wants to go back where she knows the players, knows the people, and maybe she didn't know if she could actually help, but she still had... guidance. Something. Anything. Anything but this place and this situation.

She doesn't want it. She's never wanted any of it. Not Stacy, not the Ohm, not the Daligig, not the Platinum Chip. She just wants her memories back, she wants her purpose back, she wants a home and family and friends -- she just wants to not be alone.

After the tears finally stop and after she pulls herself together, she remembers that there is still one place in the 38 she hasn't checked. She takes a deep breath, picks herself up off the floor, and returns to the elevator.

♠ ♣ ♦ ♥

Her next stop is the Hidden Valley Bunker. Even if... it isn't in the Hidden Valley any more. Whatever. Elle needs to talk to Veronica. She's the only one who would really understand. Elle doesn't know how she will react to the news about the Lucky 38, but there's something else, something more important, that she needs to know. She would know who to talk to about what she found.

Securitrons... There are Securitrons in the basement. Elle hasn't been keeping up with what's been going on elsewhere in the ship, but she is absolutely certain the robots will be able to help. Without Mr. House to give them orders, she's not sure what they'll do with them, but she's also sure there are people on Stacy who are more technologically minded than she is and would be able to find some way to get around that problem. Or she could ask Stacy to find and podpop Mr. House. But Elle doubts that her luck is that good.

[ Hidden Valley Bunker ]

[first_of_steel]

Veronica may or may not be around at the moment. Roger's not entirely sure. Right now, he's busy taking his laser rifle apart and going over all of the parts and pieces, making absolutely certain that it's in decent working order. He's no Scribe or Knight, but he'd be a pretty piss-poor High Elder if he couldn't look after his own gear when he had to.

He does look up curiously at the sound of footfalls, though. He's not so absorbed in the job as all that.

If she thinks the Public Bathroom is great, wait till she sees the Bathhouse!

[shiest_sunbeam]

The bathhouse were a place that many used for relaxation. Having been fixed recently once again after the attacks, they almost seemed more welcoming than before with some of the alterations the infrastructure crew had made on them.

It was also one of the places Ronnae liked to visit when she thought everyone was too busy working or going about her business. The timid redhead made a few playful splashing noises in the hot spring area, mostly to amuse herself as she let herself relax for once in her usually stressful day.

It was pleasant, to say the least, but it was one of those little guilty pleasures she took upon herself every so often.

*^*

[quixotically]

This place has an atmosphere unlike any Elle has seen before. A little awestruck, she slowly explores the area, taking her time and soaking up the peace and relaxation that seems to be emanating wherever she walks.

By following the sound of water, she finds a... pool-like... thing. (She's never seen a bathhouse before, okay?) It reminds her of the pool rooms in some of the casinos, only much... nicer, overall.

Oh, and let's not forget the familiar person currently enjoying the... pool.

"Ronnae?"