All he had wanted was some peace and quiet. First, he had found a way to rig the TVs in the hotel to link to the ship's library. Second, he had convinced Stacy to just let that be, and explained how odd "pulsing walls" were to most of them. Finally, he had found a couch on the far wall in the lobby that had the best view of the big screen TV the lobby had, and marked it. Above it on the wall was a plaque that read as such: RESERVED FOR FORMER YJERS/TITANS WHO WERE DECLARED DEAD IN THE LINE OF DUTY.

However, these were not exactly detractors in everyone else's mind. Every time he tried to relax and just read his back issues of "Crazed Merc" magazines, someone came in, sat down in the nearest chair, and asked him about... whatever was on their mind. He couldn't stop it, he knew it from the first. When the crazy japanese kid who he had previously lead to the sensoriums had shown up asking him about whether he should go to a dance, he had given advice. Then the priest showed up, asking about what the Outsiders were about. Now, Slobo was just waiting for the next person to come asking him, of all people, for information or advice. So he was more waiting than relaxing...

Slobo walked into the sensoriums, and the room became a true blank slate, a white empty void. He wasn't sure what he wanted. He just was angry. His general nightmares had been unchanged, though he was remembering them with more frequency now. The thought of his own failure and how easily he had been taken down by Darkseid, the thoughts of Dream-Lobo mocking him...

Right now, he just needed to vent. He focused for a moment, and a set of awkward looking drums made out of oil barrels and saw-blade cymbals appeared. He sat down, and furiously began a solo to a song that didn't exist.

Sometimes, you just need to hit things. And the noise was nice. He continued his beat, eyes closed, trying to replicate Neil Pert as best as he could, slowly getting into the rythm to "Roll the Bones". The beat covered the room, and with his eyes closed, it would be nearly impossible for him to notice someone walking in.

On the Observation Deck, the sixth candle is lit on Allen's menorah. The last five evenings have seen him distributing programs of omnicom games - simple stuff that didn't take him away from Engineering work, mostly - and tonight is much the same. Congrats, Meatshippers, you can now play tetris on your omnicoms as you stroll through the halls.

In the Sensoriums, as has been the case the previous five nights, the smell of fried food ceases right at the open door, but you can hear people inside, and a game progressing. Dreidels are cool and all, but after five nights, you gotta shake things up a bit, so the game of the evening is Apples to Apples: Jewish edition.

Allen slaps a green apple card down on the coffee table in the simulation of his living room. "Okay, the word is Putz: fool, jerk, easy mark. If you had a Grif card and were Samus, now would be the time to put it down."

[ooc: another party thread, feel free to join in the game immediately IC if you feel your character would already be playing, or you just want them to. And yes, Gentiles can play too.]

Slobo either didn't know or didn't care the racket he was making in W&P. Things were flying about until he found what he was looking for. A large selection of single articles of clothing that could easily cobble together something, a jar of hair gel, and a mirror. He wasn't happy with the mirror, he had hoped for a full-length, but beggars can't be choosers. He sat there, going through the collected clothes. First, there was a really nice red leather trench. Unfortunately, it was made for someone easily 6'5". He tossed it aside and decided to work on his hair first, since finding male clothing in his size was rather... difficult. He's so obsessed on this preening that he can, for once, easily be snuck up on by people other than ninjas.

Slobo stood back with Superbike and surveyed his work. On a street in the city, he had rigged a PA system with speakers from Outsider's Plaza. Static would probably be unhappy with that, but it's worth it. On either end of the street a red line is drawn in spray-paint. Everything was set, now he made the call and waited.

Somewhere in the City there is music... and it's loud. For blocks, easily, it can be heard pouring out from open windows and doors of the building it's coming from, and closer in, the bass can felt as much as heard.

And the building—well, the little independent office has been sharply redecorated, walls scrawled with bright runes and complex glyphs that seem almost like hyper-abstract graffiti, some of the windows methodically boarded over, the freestanding sign replaced with large, hand-lettered block print reading ROXIE'S, and under that, freelance monster removal &
artifact creation.

Maybe you've come by to tell her to turn that music down—or just to visit—or to volunteer some of the materials she asked for from anyone willing.

Slobo had been wandering through the ship. His first stop had been engineering, to use an arc-welder and tailor his plantsuit. Now sleeveless with an open neck, he felt much more comfortable, and the blowtorch had allowed to to cauterize the tears and prevent immediate regrowth. Feeling better about his garb, he simply began meandering through hallways, eventually finding himself at the hangar. As he looked at the ships and made lists of easy modifications he could offer, he passed by large piece covered in a sheet. As he walked by, it moved. He eyed it for a moment, and it proceeded to honk at him and rev an engine.

Slobo blinked. It couldn't be... could it?

***

Moments later, Slobo was peeling through the city aerially atop Superbike, flying around like a bat out of hell and screaming at the top of his lungs.

"YIPEE-KAY-AY!"

He is, however, so happy he is not exactly paying attention to things or people that may be in his way...

Dick had spent nearly twenty-four hours straight sleeping once everything was settled. Or, at least, as much as it could be settled at the moment. And that meant Dick could finally allow himself to get some rest.

Of course, the next day he was back to his usual training. The Sensoriums were able to make a pretty passable imitation of the old Titans' gymnasium. After the zombies and all the fighting, he really felt the need to stretch his limits a bit.

Katara had her time to laugh and her time to cry after finding out about her world. She'd had fun with her Outsider friends, she'd broke down in front of a person she would rather have not done that with and she was still adjusting to recent events. Throughout all that had happened, there was still the silver lining: Toph was here, and now there was only one more person she was waiting for and all of her team, would be back together again. She knew that joining the Outsiders had been a step in the right direction: she felt like she was missing something, like a part of her was just going through motions. Her friends fulfilled that, and she was glad, but there was a little part of her that wasn't filled.

So Katara found herself back in the Sensorium's, specifically the Northern Water Tribe Spirit Oasis, one of her favorite places. It was the second time she'd been here, and she was glad to be there: it was the only place in the Northern Water Tribe not covered in ice, and it was known to be a gateway to the Spirit world. The lush, quiet place never failed put her in a quiet state, and she sat there now, cross-legged and breathing slowly.

She could deal with this: she had to. But it wouldn't happen if she wasn't grounded and quiet, willing to center herself and contemplate her role in this place that would now be her home.

 Between nearly killing himself trying to help people and his talk with Nathan, Peter was exhausted. Even with his upbeat demeanor, it was hard to not say he felt stressed. His flight-breaks no longer helping, he decided he needed to take a few hours. He found himself at the sensoriums, a place he had heard talked about like the holodeck from Star Trek. As he walked in, it was a blank room. He closed his eyes and thought to himself. 

I just need a way to relax.

He suddenly heard music, and opened his eyes to what appeared to be a high class nightclub, but filled with the strangest creatures he had ever seen, even since arriving on the ship. Behind the bar, a green-skinned redhead with horns, more conspicuous for his paisley shirt and purple ascot, was trying to get his attention.  

"Hey, kiddo, didn't you hear them call your name?" The demon said, smiling. "You're up, bubbulah. Don't worry, I picked a good song for you." Peter eyed him warily. Wherever this place had come from, it was not his head. But decided not to question it, and went to stand in front of a karaoke machine on stage. He picked up the mike and saw the song, and smiled. He loved this song. EVERYONE loved this song. Luckily, a few years in boy's choir had given him a sense of tune, and puberty had left him with a decent tenor. So, he began to sing. 

o/` I can't fight this feeling any longer,
      And yet I'm still afraid to let it flow... o/` 

That was all it took. As if suddenly injected with 100 ccs of pure rock ballad awesome, Peter closed his eyes and began letting the music take him, eventually rocking out. He had forgotten what it was like, honestly. Forgotten the fun of just letting go and having fun. And as he finished up the REO Speedwagon classic, breathing heavily and feeling alive, he wished he hadn't. 

But then he opened his eyes to notice more than just his holographic audience had filtered into the "club". 

"Uh... Next?" He said as he hastily replaced the mike and went to get a holo-beer. 

That was embarrassing.  He could only hope someone would follow him up and make it slightly less so.

[ooc: Start a subthread with your character approaching the stage and singing a song. Characters can react to other's performances even if they aren't singing themselves. And any song you'd like, Lorne has the entire mutliverse on karaoke. I'm not asking, and neither should you.]

 Slobo had been puttering around the ship for an hour, thinking and looking. He quickly found that if you looked hard enough, between W&P and the City itself, you could find anything. In the end, he was standing outside a Courtyard by Marriott hotel about a click outside of "Escherville" with spraypaint and a very large block of stone. At first he had thought about the Vatican, but it was too wrecked from the zombie fight. Plus, this place had an indoor pool. He spraypainted a large message on the wall next to the door, red with black outline.

The crew meeting doesn't take place in the Obs Deck like it usually does. It takes place in the Medbay, because that's where most of the crew is gathered, and it's plenty large enough. Those that are still getting treated can sit on the beds, and those that just need to sit can sit on the beds.

When the last stragglers rejoin the others in the MedBay, when almost all the injuries have been treated, the Bridge Team finally returns, but they do not return triumphant. Most of their expressions are somber. One of their number, Paco, has come back missing an arm, and quite a few have rather nasty injuries, black eyes, burns, and so on. Jaime Reyes' armor is healed over his eye, and though said eye isn't gone (well, at least it won't be for long), it looks as if it is.

But their greatest casualty is being carried by Brainiac 5 with a flat pane of yellow shielding like an impromptu stretcher. Robin lent his cape to cover the body out of respect, but the green hand of the robot Brainiac is visible despite it.

The organic Brainy peels off from the group to silently carry the body into Special Weapons Division, to place it on one of the work-tables, as if the room is now an impromptu mortuary. An autopsy of sorts needs to be performed, after all, to ensure with absolute certainty what he already knows--that there is no way to repair their lost comrade. He will be absent from the reunion, and most likely chase out anyone that comes in.

As for the rest of them, they need medical care, probably need hugs, and mostly just need to see that the rest of the group is okay. They also need to meet the new people--who need to properly meet everyone in general, really.

[ooc: MEETING THREAD. Everybody, start subthreads and tag subthreads. This is for new people to meet folks and get a few more explanations, and also folks from the different teams just to reunite with people and see if they're okay, and all that. After the reunions and all that, free threading will resume. EVERYONE would be here, most likely. By this time, most folks would probably have joined the others.]

The conversation between the bridge crew, Stacy, and the Admiral is broadcasted where the rest of the crew is in the MedBay, and gathered right outside. Even in the bridge itself, the sound echoes over the monitors so that anyone resistant to psionics can hear Elfangor's side of the conversation.

They have now been told why they were brought to the ship.

Their worlds are gone, destroyed by the Ohm. They are refugees in an unforgiving Omniverse.

Transmigration 9 is an ark.

While Stacy is partially restored, including her core personality (which is far more personable), she is still severely damaged, and running on automatic somewhat. Until the ship can be repaired, podpops will keep occuring and they will be forced to go on missions to undo the damage the Ohm have wrought to the Omniverse. The threat of the being in Escherville is still a threat, one with no immediate solutions.

But they have allies out there, they have an AI watching over them, they have the smallest glinting traces of hope. Their loved ones are (hopefully) on board, and even beyond that, there is may be a chance, however small, of restoring their home universes.

Stacy broadcasts to the entire ship when it's all over, when all has been revealed.

||The bodies of the individuals that died today are being prepared for funeral services. A list of their names will be made available, though I can assure you that none are individuals any of you know. The funeral will be on Obs Deck in several days, and will be announced.||

||Those that wish to have their memories of their rescues restored, as proof their worlds are gone, will have a chance to request this after the services, but without grief counselors on board, I strongly recommend against it.||

||In the meantime, all of us must heal and recover from our ordeal. New areas of the ship have been made available, such as the Crew Lounge, and I have opened up the Crew Quarters for use, and cleared out the belongings of--||

Here she falters, sadness creeping into her voice.

||--of my original crew, so that all of you may sleep more comfortably. These quarters fit two people to a room, and have actual beds and sonic showers. Dining will still be provided in the Mess Hall, with periodic days of real food in the Lounge--they must be spaced out until my food stores are replenished with fresh food products.||

After a moment of thought she says: ||And because I think you've suffered enough, fornicative activities are now allowed--however, both parties must stop by the Medbay for a Contraceptive shot or this will not be allowed. These shots will provide protection for six months and do not protect against venereal disease, but all of you, barring several individuals with certain conditions--|| Like those, say, infected with zombie viruses, Steve ||--are currently disease-free.||

||The ship is now open, and the bridge team can relocate back to the Living Areas. The doors will remain open after they leave the bridge. I must now engage in heavy repairs. My AI will not be quite as available as usual. Please, take time to grieve, rest, and have your wounds treated. We will discuss more when everyone has recovered from this ordeal.||

They now know what they're up against: space pirates. Interdimensional kidnappers and ruthless scallywags, that hijack ships, and sell the ships themselves and their contents for profit.

Their spaceship is rammed through the hull of the bridge, they're outnumbered fifteen-to-one, and the pirates have some very shiny tech on their side. But even with Stacy suppressed, the crew has her on their side, as she's trying her best to hide them from view and not allow her internal defenses to be used against our stalwart Meatcrew.

Now, in the area outside the bridge, which is home to a wide open space surrounded by a network of hub tunnels and the like, the crew is going to make their stand against the pirates--and the success of this fight will decide the fate of the rest of the crew. It's not easy task, either, considering the powerful weaponry the pirates have at their disposal, and the physical strength, cyborg augments, and powers a number of them have. But they do have a plan.

Will Team GTFO succeed, reopen the ship, and be able to go back to help the others fight against whatever was released against them? (Is it already too late to help them all?) Or will they fail, will those Left Behind have to cross their fingers and hope for the best, will the crew be doomed to a horrible fate in the meat markets (both literal and figurative) of the of the pirate black markets known as the Chopping Blocks?

[ooc: As usual, old threads are still open. And subthreads will be left open so folks can tag them. For instance, even after the subthread with the pirates retreating goes up, the pirate FIGHTING can still be tagged. You can also tag multiple subthreads, since it's a big-ass brawl and you can do fun stuff like having your character flung across the fight.

OPEN FOR TAGGING]

Hal9000 had been defeated, but it isn't quite over yet. After the injured had been healed and Jaime Reyes had stopped blanking out, after they'd regrouped and got their stuff together, it was time to move on. Engineering and Neuropathy had yielded nothing fruitful.

They could, of course, just blow the ship to hell by messing with the engines, but that really didn't benefit them and they were already dead in space right now, the ship stopped in some random dimension. Neuropathy was locked down.

No, they had to make it to the bridge.

And this was one of the places on the way, a wide open area, sort of like a courtyard with something like a open-air cafe. A section tucked away was more like a lounge area, with a viewing window, like the one in Obs.

Here, someone was waiting for them, someone that had watched their every move.

He's not a very nice man. In fact...maybe they don't even have to go to the bridge. Maybe the one in control of it has come out to meet them.

[ooc: The old threads are still open, obvsly, but I'm trying to get everything up to keep things moving along.]

You have my sincerest apologies, but I have my mission.

The traps start. Rotating blades coming out of the walls and floors and ceilings, jets of fire, lasers, holographic enemies. The clear walls of the maze let them see what's happening to everyone else.

The traps start, and they have to stay alive despite them. If they stop avoiding them, it's their own fault, you see, if they die. That makes it indirect enough for Stacy's Anti-harming-the-crew protocols to be avoided, as Hal, despite his reprogramming, still has to follow some constraints.

Please commence with killing yourselves by being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The only chance the group has is if they work together to stay alive, and somehow they have to take out the shield projectors creating the maze even though they themselves are shielded...

[ooc: Cooperation is key, people. Hal can only adapt to one power/skill-set at a time, not all of them.]

Team GTFO gathers in the Living Area Level, near what appears to be a blank wall near the Sensoriums, and now it's time to distribute equipment, go over the specifics of the plan, and get ready to commence Operations. With a capital 'O'.

There's a multitude of robot drones and other equipment about.


[ooc: Read instructions for these threads here! Edit: Srsly. Read 'em. Try to keep all the subthreads as one consecutive thread. Please?]

In her sealed, silent, sensory-deprived meditation room, Roxie is sleeping. It's a special sleep: for all dreams are connected, she knows, and by spinning her mind out along the web of thought, she might step into others...

[Roxie is dream-hopping, getting a look at the subconsciousnesses of the other people on the ship. So, how it works - if you're interested, go ahead and post with a dream your character is having, and Roxie will slip into it, subtle at first but more obvious as she tries to satisfy her curiosity. Just her being around will make the dreamer more lucid and more likely to remember the whole thing when they wake up.

Also, feel free to ask any OOC questions in a thread here, or poke me on AIM at 'anagramarye'.]

The meeting is over, the teams have been assigned, the plans have been laid out. It's time to get weapons.

It's time to wish each other luck, and say goodbyes--with the hope that they're only "good bye for now"s.

It's about to get very hairy from here on out.