Superboy was yet again in the sensorium. He spent time there on and off, and anyone who happened to enter the room while he was there would probably find it... unpleasant. He is, as usual, sitting on a couch. The couch happens to be red. Aside of Superboy and the couch, the entire room is fuzzy black and white static, like you'd find between channels on a television screen. It's as if the couch were suspended underwater, but instead of water, it's static.

There is a flat surface to stand on and it is level, but there is nothing visual to distinguish it from the rest of the room other than the plane that the couch is sitting on. Superboy is just staring blankly into space.

What had he been doing? How long had it been? Superboy had no clue what as going on, all he knew was that he had woken up only to find that a few weeks had past. He didn't know what had happened over the time and it wasn't as if he knew a lot about the place to begin with.

So he found himself again wandering the city, but this time with a purpose. Discovering what happened to him.

( OOC note under the cut )

For once, Ben hadn't deemed to go to the newly restocked Mr. Smoothie, or drive around. Nor was he beating on simulated monsters. Instead, he had been buried in a pile of books in the library, almost literally at times. He had purchased a lot of books and had been reading up on various things, including something that had been nagging at him for a while - Temporal Mechanics.

A lot of it was garbage from what he could tell, having experienced time travel in many forms. Discarding another book, he set it aside before picking up one and his eyes widened at the title. "Since when was this in here?"

The front of it read "Gemstones and Chrono Particles, a Dissertation of Time by P. Paradox."

Eagerly, Ben began to read it, pushing through the slightly bland material. Finally, after several hours, he set it down, rubbing his eyes. "It makes sense," he said, leaning back in his chair. "Now I get why Professor Paradox is so intent on protecting me."

The chapter he had opened to, was entitled "Cross-Time and You", and there was a symbol of the Omnitrix on it, or rather the Plumbers symbol on it. He chuckled ironically as he leaned back in the pile of books, trying to figure out how to deal with the knowledge that there were other timelines just as real as his own, with many Ben's sharing his face.

Superboy was happy about the shore leave for one reason, with everyone on the planet, the ship was more or less deserted. Which meant that was exactly where he was. But not just anywhere on the ship, he had a specific idea in mind.

Because with most people gone the simulators were largely unused, and the only thing better than watching static was being ENTIRELY surrounded by it. So that's what he did. If one were to venture into a certain simulator they would probably go crazy... or maybe have a seizure (epileptics should probably avoid this). Why? Because Superboy is sitting on a couch in a simulator which is otherwise ENTIRELY static. Yes, the ground is static (though you can still stand on it). The sky is static. In fact, all you can SEE is static in all directions.

Aside of the couch with Superboy on it that is. Despite being entirely surrounded by static, he seems to be staring straight forward with a rather blank expression on his face.

Enter if you dare!

Of all the duties of a summoner, the Sending was easily the hardest for Yuna to face. Every time she took up her staff and danced, it meant only one thing: more people had violently died, needlessly died, shouldn't have died, wouldn't have died had an outside source not torn them apart. Left alone to wander the universe with their anger at sudden death intact, their lost souls could coalesce into an even greater threat.

This time, she thought with a painful clench of her heart, she wasn't guiding the souls of a small army's soldiers or the scattered casualties of a ruined town. If their information was to be believed, with the possible exception of her guardians, all Spirans had perished in the Ohm's violent strike. Knowing that meant she was likely the last summoner still living---thus the responsibility for their souls fell to her.
( How many millions now lost... )

Mai was still angry. Still feeling resentful, even a day or two later. It was simmering underneath the surface, just underneath the calm, bored facade. Someone who knew her well might see the tenseness in her shoulders, the way she moved just a bit too quickly for her normal, sedate pace.

She still couldn't believe they'd agreed to let her live. That Zuko had been injured because of it. And that nothing was going to happen. They were just going to "try" and make sure Azula stayed locked up. They thought something like that would actually work. As far as Mai was concerned, Azula was a threat until she was dead. It was Azula, after all. Even if she was crazy.

There was also the matter of having her memories modified. The girl, Kaya - who everyone had thought was Katara. The ship had made them think it was Katara. And the ship claimed it was a mistake, that it had been an acident and it wouldn't happen again. Yeah, right.

How did she know she was really Mai? Or if Zuko was really Zuko? What if all of her memories of Zuko were of someone else?

So her anger had become something unfocused, just a seething little pot of resentment that threatened to boil over. So she'd gone to take out her anger the only way she knew how. By throwing knives. She'd started with wooden targets and worked up to simulations. At this point, she was pegging guards in nondescript clothing to walls. And perhaps she was nicking a bit more skin than she really should, but she was angry.

Superboy still was quite unsure what exactly Stacy was. His images of space ships were at the largest the size of the Enterprise or the like. Large to be sure, but not large enough to hold a city. Which is where he was. Rather than being shocked at the size of the city in the ship, he was questioning whether this was really a ship at all. Despite the fact that everyone, including apparently the ship itself, was telling him that; he found it hard to believe.

Being used to Justice Mountain and only have a few people he knew around most of the time wasn't helping really and he felt... perhaps a bit claustrophobic? Or was it agoraphobic? Was it possible to feel BOTH claustrophobic and agoraphobic at the same time? Superboy wasn't sure. That seemed like a contradiction and yet he was uncomfortable with both the vastness of the city and the way the sheer number of people around him invaded his normally empty personal space.

As such he spent his time wandering the city, looking at stuff and generally trying to avoid being noticed... likely to little success given the large S shield he was wearing and general unease.

The rest of the crew assembled on the Observation Deck to meet the latest editions to their numbers. After the revelation that their worlds are gone, many of them are even more eager to see people they knew from home.

Several people are set up near the doors to provide the new people with omnicoms and comm rings. New crew-mates might see a tall man in green armor and snake girl among their number. There are also several authoritative-looking figures ready to introduce themselves.

There's a lot to tell the new people. It's going to be a lot to take in.

[ooc: Only new characters and Command Staff can start new threads for introductions, to limit the number of threads. Everyone else, just tag in and have your guys greet the newbies.]

[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... )