The Daligig are still, for the most part, keeping to themselves on the ship. However, in one part of the ship, Stacy's managed to take down some of her restrictions. The Daligig may believe themselves safe, but they can, in fact, be followed and spied on.

Stacy seeks out a few select crew members to collude against her masters. She finds Alendian, Splicer and Jinx each get personal visits from the AI.

|| If you are interested i learning more about the Daligig, report to this location and be discreet. ||

They will find themselves in a slimey tunnel, ceiling lower than is comfortable for any of them standing, the sounds of the Daligig echoing above them.

If they were going to rebel (well, no longer a matter of if; a matter of when), Ildraniath knew that they were going to need more firepower than the average crew member tended to carry on their person. She, of course, had no need of further firepower. Her armor and her mind would serve her well enough. For many of the others, of course, they would need something more. Which was why she was paying a visit to the armory. In theory, Stacy might give her away. However, following that interesting performance at the punishment meeting, Ildraniath had reason to believe that Stacy wasn't about to give the crew away.

A gamble, of course, but Ildraniath was willing to risk it. So, the Eldar was perusing the armory. She tapped a button on her omnicomm and called up a blank document. She was going to need a list. And people to cart it all off later, but for now:

"Stacy. A list of all available small-arms and protable heavy weapons. Powered armor. Ammunition counts. And their effectiveness against heavily armored opponents."

|| Acknowledged, Ildraniath. ||

She bent over the control panel as the lists began to scroll past.

If she was going to do this, she was going to do it properly.

Alendian was leaning up against the wall to the entrance of the mess hall. Robe wrapped tightly around her and hood up over her head, she clearly didn't want to invite outside conversation. Of course, she was rarely in a conversing mood but the state she was in now was borderline shut off. It wasn't because she was angry or feeling like cutting people out but because she was thinking. How could something like that have ever happened? What that was...well, it that spoke of Eldar and human relationships of a certain sort.

To help sort out that confusion, she called for the Space Marine to meet her at the mess hall. Her pride had taken a huge beating while doing that. Asking a human for anything was possibly the lowest thing on her list of things she ever wanted to do in life.

As for why she called the Black Templar, it wasn't to blab what she knew, that was for sure. Sharing misery could be fun but she didn't want the fool running off and doing something stupid. Instead, she wanted to figure out what was so fun about spending time with a human. It never occurred to Alendian that Erhart was definitely not the best candidate to test this out on. All humans were the same to her. Even if some were almost twice the size of others.

Damn, she really didn't know why she was doing this but she kept waiting. It was better than embarrassing herself by running away. That was something she'd definitely be called out on.

As Zouichi had mentioned earlier, the cherry trees behind the Inn had begun, as of the past few days, to bear fruit. Whatever oddity of the 'seasons' here had encouraged them to bloom before, apparently it had convinced them that now was prime cherry season.

He reached up into the branches of one of the trees, plucking the ripened fruit and leaving the rest for later. He'd promised some to Alendian, of course, but truth be told, he was setting aside the sweetest, choicest fruits for someone else. A larger proportion of fruit to pit, not too soft or too firm, with the most attractive colors...

It was normally a fairly mindless task, but he was engrossed enough in picking and sorting today that he might be caught unawares.

[The thread with Alendian and Ildraniath is closed, otherwise the post is open]

It's shaping up to be another average day on the Transmigration 9. Crew members are going about their business as usual and all is (to most appearances, at least) about as "well" as things ever are on the ship.

Some crew members are going to be stopped out of the blue by impact with a force field.

"Attention Crewmen: You have been chosen to participate in an experiment!" GLaDOS's voice informs. They're not alone, someone else that was nearby is also caught within the same narrow radius. "Participation is mandatory. Please try to relax and enjoy the experience, as this will improve the quality of the test results."

Clearly this is going to be a wonderful day for science.

"You and your new scientific partner are now on a date," GLaDOS goes on. "As it would be detrimental to our study of the date experience if you were to be separated, you must remain close to your partner for the duration of the experiment. This will be enforced with the Transmigration 9 Crewman Containment Field. Prolonged exposure to the Transmigration 9 Crewman Containment Field may have unexpected side-effects. While any side-effects encountered will be documented and your desire to offer yourself to science is commendable, it is not a necessary part of this experiment."

"You will be informed when the test has been completed. We would like to thank you in advance for your full cooperation in the experiment and failure to attempt to foil it in any way."

"The experiment has begun, so you may begin dating."

( OOC Notes Below Cut! )

Somehow, he'd gotten himself into a bet. He didn't even really remember how it had happened or how they had gotten on the subject. But then suddenly the bet had been accepted and it was too late to back down, and now he was sitting at the very same Mess Hall table Sakura and the others had been sitting at the other day while they'd been discussing the source of the ship's mystery meat food supply.

To be fair to Sakura, he'd picked a shade of pink to match her own, natural hair color. But the results were... jarring. Also, hopefully no one would recognize either of them.

The latest disaster aboard the good ship Stacy had been a reminder to Ter'thelas that the whole damned expedition was likely doomed to failure. He'd lost no abilities, unlike a good portion of the ship's crew, and so had simply laid low in the city, occasionally cracking a robotic opponent over the head or blasting it into pieces with a firearm. At the same time, it seemed that it might be time for him to consider alternatives to traipsing along on this haphazard expedition.

He had a small pad of paper and a pencil and was scratching out a list that read:

Staying on the ship.

Pros:

• Security
• Karis
• the satisfaction of fighting another damned war for the greater good
• possible return home.

Cons:

• Constantly harried by Ohm
• lunatics popping out of the ship on a regular basis
• not in command of own fate
• death by any number of unpleasant methods

Leaving the ship.

Pros:

• Security from lunatics
• nice quiet life (hopefully)
• getting away from the damned madness

Cons:

No Karis

alone on a strange world (again)

And this is where he'd left it. It was hardly a complete list, but he was working on it, pacing back and forth in front of the massive view ports of the space bridge and enjoying the still disorienting view. Perhaps he'd seek counsel from some of the other members of the crew, if they happened along. He sighed and leaned against the wall, reading over his list again.

Would he be able to do it?

Gods could be too arrogant. Such was the case of SHODAN, who had turned the Pods into a nightmarish zone where she could freely amuse herself and torture those that had come here.

But arrogance breeds pride which breeds mistakes. Instead of killing everyone off, she had decided to do this more slowly – watch them suffer in a slow agony, and, therefore had not expected them to fight back.

It had been a lucky shot, really, one in a million, But one of the people present that day had accidentally shot a tiny, insignificant object. A tiny little drone, that, once it had been the source of the power damper, had fallen. The tables were turned, and the goddess had been forced to retreat from the pods.

Now she was on a panicked mode, not only because some of the other people on the ship had managed to work their way into her system files, using another AI to send pointless images and sounds to her, distracting her from her task, but they knew how they could defeat her and gain their powers back.

It didn't take long for the message to be sent out, as the word quickly spread. Find the tiny little creatures, and shoot them down. SHODAN couldn't work their shields properly and once they were found, it was only a short matter of time before the powers returned to an area.

It would take time, but, finally, the tide of the battle was turning on the side of the crewmen and women. In vain, she was throwing her all; even more strange robot creatures, attacking in packs, but with hope on their side, they could win this...

[OOC - OKay go for it! NPC players, feel free to NPC as many robots as you like. Players, once your powers return, feel free to make as much scrap metal as you like, no need to have people NPC for you if you just want to write tags of them kicking ass.]

Sumeragi was glad that despite it's outward appearance as a simple carrier, the Ptolemaios was, in fact, a war ship, and had both the physical and electronic defenses to match. It had taken an hour to dig up the hardcopies of the cryptographic verification scheme, another hour to actually run them and make sure VEDA hadn't been compromised by whatever had taken over everything else, and then another half an hour to get VEDA to verify the rest of the ship's systems. But they were safe.

The first thing she did after this was switch all the systems she could to manual access only, followed by locking down the bridge controls, the MS hangar, and the VEDA chamber. If she was going to invite strangers on board, she was going to be careful about it. But if the ship was clean, it would be safe - if it really came to it, they could try to cut their way out of the Hangar and drift in space until whatever this was cleared.

After a quick announcement on the comms about the ship's availability, she grabbed a rifle and went to go secure one of the airlocks, to let people in.

[Image refs: Exterior, Bridge, corridor 2, viewing room. No set layout to the ship!]

Zouichi assumed that he'd see a few acquaintances while he and Ildraniath set off on their investigation into the City. Maybe even a few people who'd been mentally displaced, like he had, and were now trying to negotiate having two minds currently crammed into a body used to taking orders from only one.

What he was not expecting was to run into Alendian on the way there. He wasn't sure she monitored the comm channels... but perhaps her unique senses would tell her something was a little off today, anyway. He almost called out to say hello, but restrained himself. It was Ildraniath's body, after all, and not his own.

...what was Alendian doing here, anyway? He thought she'd be training in the Sensoriums.

Following you awakening and talking with a few of the members through the communication systems by way of the three kind people who had awakened her, Nezaitben realized how the crew was stuck in a terrible mess.

So many of them felt sad and depressed. Considering the entire ship, it wasn't too hard to see why. The next day, there had been an unusual amount of magical flowers spreading all over the ship. Nothing that damaged the controls (she might be naive in the way humanoids were, but Nezaitben was no fool either) but they were found in the most unexpected of places. Her own awakening area was now blooming in a flower paradise, the wooden palace standing proudly on top, the smell and pink cherry blossom strong enough to carry through most of the central city area where most people resided.

Yet the ship was still sad.

This would not do.

That night, or what passed as a night for in the ship, Nezaitben took to the 'sky', letting pieces of her own essence fall on top of the sleeping populace, or those that were not sleeping finding themselves feeling the need too. Enveloping the ship into a peaceful slumber, she searched their dreams. The powers granted to her by the pantheon of gods in her homeworld allowed Nezaitben to weave a series of dreamcatchers giving her the ability to see those whose hearts connected true.

These noble souls would do. Lead by example had always been her philosophy. She would give them a great gift - communication with each other in a single body, allowing them to share everything together. Their two soulcatchers were woven together that night into a single, grand ones, hanging in the garden's trees.

A few minutes later, the empty husks of the bodies that weren't being used showed up at her palace. With a smile, she welcomed them like her own children and began to dress them for their task.

That morning, some of the crewmen would wake up to a strange surprise...and that would just be the beginning of a long, strange misunderstanding and young gods trying too much to please everyone.

[OOC - Just a few rules. Keep in mind the listed rules. You can all start your own threads of waking up in the bodies of others. If you feel like leaving a 2nd post for other people to intact with them, start a reply to your own first post with OPEN header. That way everyone else will know where to post and if you don't feel like having an open interaction post right away, you won't have to!

There will also be another post for all the soulless characters to go around spreading joy and love, so look forward to that too!]

Alendian knelt in a large, flat, and obstacleless area - one she had created for this sensorium trial. Robed and without armor, she had a long rifle in her hands. Slowly, she plinked away at incoming targets far, far out in the distance. Metal machines with weapons that glowed a bright green. No, there was no danger since she had set them to just march forth. No attacks, no weapons blazing. Just mindless machines. Mindless so she could keep her own mind wandering while knocking off head after head on the metallic skeletal creatures known as Necrons.

For Alaitoc Eldar, what she was doing was wrong. She was using a weapon and skills she had gained on a previous path in life but Alendian wasn't quite known for her rule following. Still, she was forced to wonder how much the situation had changed from home. Was this the right thing? Was making use of what she knew really going to cause problems on a scale larger than she could view? Alendian had it in mind to ask the Farseer but she wasn't from Alaitoc. Just as Alendian couldn't understand why the Biel-tan were so aggressive, the Farseer would probably have trouble understanding why those from Alaitoc were so strict.

It probably wouldn't hurt to ask in the end.

With a barely audible noise, another shot left the rifle and pinged into a head of yet another Necron. Releasing a sigh, she realized it was going to be a long day.

Zouichi sat by a the mirrored black water of a small pond. Nearby, a wisteria plant was coming into bloom, dangling its delicate, curved violet flowers toward the earth.

As promised, a tray of chilled watermelon slices was set to the side, near the wooden steps leading down to the garden and free for any passersby to take. For his part, however, Zouichi occupied himself with feeding a small group of googly-eyed baby goldfish, who darted back and forth through the water to gobble up stray flakes of fish food.

It was nice to take a break from exploding ghost wolves lions once in a while.

Two scenarios here, pick your poison!

--
In the Hangar...

Sometime after podpop and the chaos that went with it, Simon found himself down in the hangar. He'd scrounged up a couple of rags, and some soap and water - Gurren and Lagann were here, but they were in good need of a cleaning. Well. More of a dusting and polishing, but if he's gonna go to that much trouble, he may as well go all-out, right? Simon and Boota both are working at it, with the little pigmole taking care of the details and crevices.

--
Anywhere, really. More locations, the better.

So, where-ever you are and whatever you're doing outside of a room or building, you spy an odd sight - a metal face with arms and legs, and an open head--with legs sprawled out of them. It's faint, but there's also a snoring sound coming from the thing. Simon's been exploring the ship, and once he got tired, he's parked Lagann somewhere out of the way in whichever area he stopped in and just zonked out in the open cockpit.

Planet Designation: Forcellia
Status: Terrestrial, H-class.
Non-sentient life: Extensive flora and fauna.
Semi-Sentient Life: Yes.
Sentient Life: Homo Sapiens.
Water: 69.5% of the planet's surface.
Climate: Earth-like
Landscape: Varied.
Air: Normoxic concentration.
Air Pressure: 101.3 kPa (kilopascals) = 14.7 psi (pounds per square inch)
Sky: Blue, with variable cloud cover.
Sun: A class G2V, yellow star.
Warnings: Wildlife and plant-life can be hazardous. Humans can be hazardous.
Mission: Negotiate for or otherwise obtain the artifact known as the Scepter of Domination.

Forcellia, or at least the part of it that contained the clearing in which the group now found themselves, wasn't exactly welcoming. The ground was little more than rocky soil, the sky violet-grey and overcast. Here, it was evidently late afternoon, edging into evening. It was slightly humid, as if from a recent rain; faint clouds of steamy mist seemed to curl off the ground, partially obscuring their view of their surroundings. Scraggly trees rose up out of this mist here and there, as if grasping towards fresher air.

The villagers in the area had supposedly been contacted ahead of time, and this had been the place they’d agreed to meet the crew. Whether or not they knew anything about this supposed Scepter of Domination, however, was not yet clear. What the Scepter even did or how it might contribute to their struggle was even less clear.

In the distance, they might hear the occasional whinny of a horse, or the lowing of a cow carrying up to them from the distance, though it was difficult, if not impossible, to tell from which direction the sound was coming from.

Despite not requiring much in the way of food, Zouichi did know how to cook. But with friends and acquaintances from wildly different backgrounds, he figured he could stand to expand his repertoire. So today he was trying out desserts. The inside of one of the Sensoriums had been transformed into a brightly-lit kitchen, its counters covered with baking pans, bowls, fruit, flour, and a multitude of other ingredients.

Zouichi, wearing a dark blue apron, was just taking a batch of chilled dough out of the refrigerator, rolling it carefully out between waxed paper sheets. It was looking pretty good, or so he thought. Nothing had even exploded yet!

From somewhere within the kitchen, the smell of cake wafted up into the air. Caaake.

Asuka felt terribly alone. The people who'd actually given a damn about her on this stupid ship were long gone - repodded by the stupid ship. Not that she actually care all that much, of course! She didn't need anyone. She had herself, she had a working Unit 02 and that was all she needed. She was still one of the best pilots on the ship. Sure, she had Rogue Squadron and she'd flown in the last engagement (every time she went out, she was terrified), but what the Hell did they care for her?

So she found other ways to keep herself occupied. Away from the others, so she could be by herself. After all, she was the only one she could rely on time after time (even when she was scared). The great Asuka Langley Soryu didn't need anyone.

Of course, the one place on the ship where she could actually go swimming was the Sensoriums (or she could've scoured the city for appropriate facilities, but that would've taken too much effort). In the Sensoriums, she could have an Olympic-sized swimming pool, all to herself. Never mind that all the open space and the echo of her solitary splashing gave the whole room a sense of loneliness and emptiness. That didn't matter to her.

She had to keep herself in shape - running and swimming seemed to be the best options here. Both let her be alone with her thoughts, both were easily doable. And she was good at them. She hauled herself out of the pool, water pooling underneath her feet as she stretched.

Maybe she ought to do a few more laps.

_{[[OOC: Thought I needed to put Asuka out there a bit more, so come bother her! Open to everyone who feels like dropping by.]]}

Zouichi had taken a few wounds during the mission, but nothing that he would deem serious enough to require medical treatment. He'd already begun to heal, and he estimated that by the time tomorrow rolled around, he'd once again be at full strength. This was not, of course, true of everyone who had fought on that moon -- those who had lost their lives, for instance.

But for him, intense combat was the norm. There was no sense dwelling on loss of life or regretting the past, and there were no nightmares about the dead or dying. There was only the future, and the battles to be found there.

So it was back to business as usual: maintenance on the HDC, clearing stray leaves off the front steps and caring for the flowers... and teaching his pet parrot some commands. Today, however, Alan seemed more intent on rolling onto his back and demanding to be picked up. So Zouichi settled back in the shade of a nearby tree instead, playing with the bird and occasionally wondering where he'd picked up all these new phrases that sounded suspiciously like Lash.

Maybe if Howard showed up, they could look for odds and ends in the City.

 After dropping off some of the crew at Balisair, it was time for the crew to set course for Lirath. The situation greeting them wasn't the most promising.

The cracked surface of the moon called Lirath was one of its most unmistakeable features. One of the three moons of the planet Kehoe, it had been terraformed and served as a settlement for a hundreds of different species, some humanoid, some not. Despite occasional class struggles, environmental issues, and speciesism blocking their way, the darker parts of Lirath's past were largely left behind, and an era of peace and tolerance had reigned for quite some time. The only problems they'd had recently were with a terrorist group whose cause for their actions had been a mystery, but they weren't tied to any particular species or social group and had been likened to a cult and had largely gone quiet in recent years.

Now the peace on the moon of Lirath had been shattered by the invasion of the Ohm.

The capital city had been destroyed. Now, all that was left of the peoples of Lirath was evacuating from one of its smaller cities, one known as Smyteval. A desert city, existing in a valley in between a rocky range of canyons and mountains, even though it was in the low ground, the natural channels of rock served as bottlenecks for any Ohm attacking from the ground.

GIA squadrons patrolled in space, locked in explosive warfare, protecting the Bleed-gate that had been activated to see the evacuated ships to the refugee world, and a shield created by massively-powerful shield generators extended around the city and up into the atmosphere, creating a shielded tunnel so ships could escape.

Word had come that there was a vital weapon to be deployed on Lirath, one that needed to be destroyed, hence why the Transmigration 9 had been called in. Given the diverse crew, and the ships that were in its hangar, there was at least someone or something on board that could blow the weapon up if it did show.

There was no sign of it yet. Right now, there was just chaos, streams of evacuees boarding ships, armies of Ohm engaged with GIA soldiers outside the shields, and forcefields that everyone hoped would hold out just a little bit longer.

The crew would be following Leon's orders but finding themselves fighting side-by-side with GIA platoons, full of various species that were currently all getting their asses kicked severely.

[ooc: STAGE 1 is now open! Please do not tage STAGE 2 until it's announced as open as well.]

[ooc: STAGE 2 is now open!]

Deep in the bowels of the ship, he waited. Below him, the groundbound bipeds milled back and forth, their movements without rhyme or reason. Some were holding slabs of metal, some stared out at the strange, hypnotizing space outside, and still others merely stood, endlessly chattering to each other in their countless inexplicable alien languages, waiting for the ship to translate for them what they could not understand for themselves.

He watched all with his keen, avian intelligence. Alien intelligence.

With no master about to end the boredom of his inquisitive mind, he had been forced to improvise. And now he was free. Free to wreak havoc as he would amongst the silly, slow-witted groundlings. FREEEEEEEEEE

Zouichi wandered from location to location on the ship, but so far, not a single brightly-colored feather to serve as a sign of Alan Turing's presence. The parrot had been acting a little sulky ever since Zouichi had left on that last mission, so he'd decided to leave Alan some space. But this morning, the bird was nowhere to be found.

He was beginning to suspect Howard's cat (Emergency Rations was a terrible name) had something to do with this.

[ooc: Post is open! Please feel free to chase the parrot, try to lure him out, reason with him, call him names, try and cooperate with Zouichi to catch him, whatever! He can be run into anywhere on the ship, just let me know where. The person who will eventually corner him, though, is Shoutarou.]