[ january i log: cetaganda ]

[barrayarmods]

Who: Everyone
What: Arrival on Barrayar and what follows
When: January 2nd - January 17th
Where: Cetagandan base
Warnings: None (at the moment)


welcome to barrayar.
It's the dark of night when you come to beyond the foothills. Snow on the ground, chill winter wind whistling. A steep mountain range towers overhead, its peaks illuminated by the light of two moons, and the foothills behind you ascend quickly into rocky mountain faces. Whatever you last remember, it isn't how you got here, and you feel oddly jetlagged, slightly queasy.

And you're not alone. There are nine other people close by, all looking equally lost and confused. But before any of you have a chance to figure out what's going on, the soldiers arrive.

They're fitted with what look like futuristic tactical vests and armed with some kind of energy weapons that look deadlier than not. They surround you at gunpoint, dealing orders in intelligible English, but with some obscure, unplaceable accent, and their faces are colored with vivid paint. It quickly becomes apparent, however, that you are not the people they at first assumed -- something about Barrayarans, the barbarians in the mountains. The one who seems to be in charge steps away to murmur into what looks like a wristwatch-like communicator. After a minute or two of inaudible conversation, the officer steps back in. He orders his men to escort you all back to their base. As long as you cooperate, that's all that will happen.


the base
You are taken back to a military base of considerable scale and some serious fortification. There are two rounds of guard checks to go through, both taking what must be a lot longer than usual, and it's cold out. You are ushered past the guard checks into what looks like a barracks building, but relegated to a bunk on one end. They seem to have cleared the immediate area, with guards posted at the door, but there's audible activity beyond the short hallway in front of the door. They make it clear you are not under arrest, that you are merely being detained until they have ascertained the situation -- the word quarantine is used, but it doesn't seem to be of a medical sort. Either way, the only people who come to the bunk are those cleared by the guards, and they all seem much more interested than hostile.

They answer your questions with the very basic facts: the people who hold custody of you are the military service of the Cetagandan Empire, and the planet you are on is their Ninth Satrapy, and they're currently at odds with some of the native population. They won't say it outright, but it's clear they have no clue how you came to be here or why, but it's clearly of great interest to them. For the most part, the Cetagandan soldiers are civil, if at times distant and aloof, but if you look a little less -- or more -- than human, they'll eye you with visible curiosity, perhaps even some kind of appreciation.

At daylight, a few women in lab coats and the same face-paint as the soldiers come to the room to escort you across the base to the nearby medbay, two or three at a time. The medbay is an intimidatingly sterile and state-of-the-art facility, all gleaming chrome and polished glass and crisp holo displays. You are taken in one at a time for a physical examination -- they have to make sure you haven't brought any foreign contagions into their base, after all -- but the military physician isn't the only base personnel in the exam room. You hear the word exotic tossed around a few times until they realized they're talking about you. They call you the exotics.


the exotics room
For a military bunk, it's in surprisingly tasteful design. The room sleeps a dozen soldiers, so you even have a little bit of room to yourself, and while the furnishings are relatively spartan, they're hardly uncomfortable. If you're in need of clothing, the soldiers will bring you base fatigues – no rank insignia, of course, but the make of the textile is surprisingly fine.

You're served food at mealtimes, a combination of shelf-stable meal rations and what seems to be fresh food, all prepared with unusual artistry for a military base. There's a sophistication to the preparation that seems more like it belongs in a four-star restaurant than a military base. If you have any special medical needs, they'll do their best to attend to them -- and their medicine seems impressively advanced.

Soldiers and scientists alike come to the room every so often to ask you questions, more like interviews than interrogations, but behind the civility there's a burning intellectual curiosity. They seem intent on knowing as much as you'll tell them, and then some.

The nearest bathroom is at the end of the hall, and while they seem to have cleared the area of all other personnel, showers and baths are scheduled, and any trips to the restroom are chaperoned. The guards, while not hostile, are certainly not interested in letting you escape. You could try sneaking past them, but you probably won't get far.

Well, at least you've got each other for company: the exotics on the Ninth Satrapy.

Comments

Lady Diya d'Zefyst (NPC)

[eugengineer]

The exotics brought to the medbay are taken one by one into an examination room – for a full physical examination, of course, and evidently what the Cetagandan medical personnel consider a 'full' exam is very thorough indeed. Vitals, tests of hearing, vision and reflexes, full-body scans, blood drawn for analysis by the labs – the works. These are conducted by a Cetagandan military doctor, apparently the Chief Medical Officer, and a small team of med techs for assistance.

The ghem physicians aren't the only ones in the room, however. The woman in a lab coat is of preternatural beauty, far beyond even the aesthetically cultivated ghem appearance – and she is clearly not ghem, her face free of paint. She is radiant even in her reserved expression, looking more like some sculpture come to life than a person, almost uncannily so when she isn't moving. Her sleek black hair is long – more than waist-length, judging by the elaborate style it's done up in. It seems the sort of style that ought to be adorned with colorful, decorative combs, but despite her striking beauty, she has an overall air of austerity to her.

She is clearly not a physician, but appears to be supervising the medical examination of each exotic. When she speaks, her voice is just as uncannily beautiful as the rest of her, though she mostly speaks only in low tones to the med techs at first, murmuring vague commentary. From time to time she will address the exotics with questions about their origins or physiology, some of them rather invasive by some people's standards. Although the overall mood in the room is quite clinical, she is nothing less than civil.

[infailtration]

When the techs find York's neural implant they wave the doctor back over, speaking quickly and with great interest, asking him questions about what it is and how it got there. York doesn't answer, just asks if it's still active and if they can get it working again. They don't know, but he's agitated and causing a bit of a commotion that may draw the Lady over. He wants to see their equipment to try and scan it himself and they don't want to surrender anything to the stranger. Understandably.

[pigsfeet]

By Daryl's standards, he's been a damn saint so far. He hasn't hit any of the guards, hasn't tried to escape the guards, hasn't tried to punch a goddamn hole in their shiny walls. He does it for the other people here. They're terrified, and he knows making the kind of fuss he's itching for will just spook the guards and get them all the closer to being lined up against a warehouse wall.

The whole thing, the false politeness, the smiley bullshit, reminds him more of Terminus than he'd like to admit. Being rounded up and told to bend over and cough in a fancy lab doesn't help. Terminus didn't have a lab, they didn't care that goddamn much. But the clinical way Gareth and his shitheads looked at them, like they weren't people, just things to be used up, sets him back farther than he'd like to admit.

It all comes to a head when a doctor asks him to open his mouth so she can stick a swab in it. "Screw you," he says, his voice a low growl.

[mirrortide]

It's the fact that Lapis has no idea what is even going on her that makes her rather compliant. She doesn't understand what's going on, or why she feels so... off. Why she feels like her form is wrong and if she could just stop her body from shuddering every now and again, it'd be great. There's something wrong with her powers too. No matter how hard she tries, she just can't call her wings.

Now that she's been ushered inside and is apparently going through some sort of examination, she's given up. She doesn't exactly fight it, but she does try and pull her limbs away from any sort of grabbing. She'll answer the questions though, because maybe if she's compliant they'll let her go?

"I'm from Homeworld." To answer the question about her origins. "Gem, Lapis Lazuli." To answer the question of her species.

[threemoons]

"Get your paws off me!" Darkstalker roared, nearly biting the hand of one of the med techs who had managed to draw some of his blood and was now escaping with the blue filled syringe. He was shaking with rage and a growing dread, because that shouldn't have been possible. His scales were impenetrable. There was no way they should been able to stab him with anything: swords, daggers, or strange needles.

"I demand to speak with whoever is in charge here." He shouted, rearing up and flaring his wings wide to scatter the rest of the humans near him. In the eerie white light, the silver scales on his wings glinted like diamonds, and even his black scales seemed to glitter with a deep midnight blue that usually went unseen.

[asafepairofhands]

Ratchet permits himself to be poked and prodded, watching the medtechs and their equipment with sharp eyes before they settle on Diya--doctor or not, she's clearly in charge, and he straightens a little when she asks him a question. He doesn't seem particularly ruffled by her beauty, though he's smart enough to be wary.

"Care to give me any particular reason I should give you anything beyond my name and rank?" he asks lightly, his voice still raw from the cold outside. He knows they could toss him right back out the front door, but... doesn't think they will, or he wouldn't be pushing his luck.

[protocol]

Wash isn't exactly afraid of doctors. It isn't as simple as that. He's just -- uncomfortable, understands the necessity for physical exams but doesn't like them, and really he's perfectly fine with being seen by a medic on the field, or with Grey on Chorus. It's just. Places like this.

All white and gleaming walls, chrome and holographic displays, people in lab coats and masks. The tech is different ( very different, probably not any more advanced than what Wash is familiar with but everything here is certainly unfamiliar ), but the air of it is the same, clinical, professional, reminds him too much of surgeons standing over him and telling him that everything will be fine, when.

There's someone in the room that catches his eye. She's not wearing any of the face paint that Wash has seen on almost everyone else, and she seems like she might be in charge, or supervising, at least. Wash tries to remain calm throughout the examination, but his tension is obvious, insisting that he do most things on his own even when some med tech offers to help, maybe snapping a little at someone who might've reached out to take his arm. He's trying to listen for what they're talking about, that woman especially, but it's hard to focus like this and a lot of the words she says sound alien, unfamiliar.

He's just gotten out from a full body scan, and she's asked him something -- he doesn't hear her properly, preoccupied with staring warily at some readouts on a nearby screen, rubbing a little anxiously at his wrist with his other hand. It takes him a moment to realize that she'd been speaking to him, turning to look at her, frowning.

"What was that?" A pause, and since she seems like she's in charge in some capacity, "And is all this -- necessary?"

Lieutenant Gail ghem-Estif (NPC)

[ghemhotstuff]

One of the more curious and outgoing of the Cetagandans is a young man – he appears nearly once a day, if not more – bringing things from outside the compound itself such as candied fruit or, rarer, chocolate along with any other object a person might ask for within reason. He's more than happy to share with whoever asks, and is happy to converse with any exotic about any topic they please. His face paint is less impressive than those around him, indicating that he is of little consequential rank, and what's discernable under the swirls of paint is a face that has been sculpted into attractiveness by some unseen genetic force.

Those exotics who bear little resemblance to any previously established image of humanity bear the full force of his curiosity, although he has plenty to spare for other exotics, and he eagerly peppers everyone with questions – names, where they're from, what was it like. His curiosity and questions, while perhaps invasive at times, are clearly genuine. It never hurt someone to be interested in them, in his opinion.

[infailtration]

York may be a bit out of his head but he's still observant of his surroundings. Hyper observant, even, without Delta to contribute. So he notices the man that keeps coming back, coming back with treats for them, even, and thinks maybe he'd be sympathetic. He approaches without his usual charm, simply opening with a desperate, "Can you get me back to the medical bay..?" He's hardly slept the past few days and there are dark circles under his eyes, a general pallor to his appearance. Maybe he's sick?

[standsentinel]

Maybe it's the vestiges of earnest Lieutenant Alenko recognizing a similar soul, or maybe it's a more cynical reflection that if this is an interrogator in disguise, they've at least sent a friendly one, but Kaidan has proven tolerant of the young officer's visits. Occasionally, he even approaches with questions of his own, even if it appears he's approaching to divert the ghem-Lieutenant away from one of the more visibly exotic arrivals in order to give them a break.

Whether it's diversion or curiosity, today the major gives their visitor a nod and an opening of "Have you got time for a cultural question?" Between the lieutenant's enthusiasm and the general unspoken insistence on having every square centimeter of space, clothing and sustenance look good, Kaidan's come to the conclusion that culture, particularly theirs, is like catnip for these people. It's oddly similar to the asari, in a very human way.

[asafepairofhands]

"Lieutenant, right?" Ratchet catches Gail relatively detached from the rest of the group, looking a little wary but certainly not hostile. He turns a hand palm-out. "...I heard you might be taking requests."

haut side-eyes

[eugengineer]

Diya pays attention. To her own affairs first and foremost, but she hardly got as far among the haut as she did by being short-sighted. Thousands of people on the base, but she misses little, if only by the grace of her ghem-lady informants from time to time. But she certainly isn't the only one paying attention to Gail ghem-Estif. Only a lieutenant, perhaps -- for now, he's still quite young for a ghem officer -- but the son of a very prominent ghem lord. Certainly the son of ghem-General Estif, leading the invasion in Vorbarr Sultana, is destined for a bright future, even if he had only been born to one of the General's ghem wives. Provided certain other things about him don't come to light, that is. Nothing confirmed -- no, of course, only suspicions and rumor. But a haut intuition is hardly one to be ignored.

And then there's his behavior of late. They all treat the exotics with nothing less than civility -- to be cruel and brash would be to lose face, and make them no better than the backwater barbarians they're trying to enlighten. But the ghem-Lieutenant, he goes farther than that. He's been quite friendly with them. No need to treat them poorly, of course, but they're hardly Cetagandans.

She catches him as he's leaving the exotics' designated area, on her way to the medbay herself, gently intercepting him in the hallway.

"Lieutenant ghem-Estif," she greets him in typical haut courtesy, her voice smooth and soft. "Mingling with the exotics again, are we?"

Mingling, as though they're at some party in the capital, as though the exotics are diplomatic guests. She glances down at his empty hand, as though to see what it was he left without. "Bringing them sweets?" She smiles just slightly, a crease of her eyes. "Do you plan to ask the ghem-General if you can keep them?"

york | ota

[infailtration]

a cold welcome

York arrives stripped of his armor, in just the thin, skintight undersuit he wears beneath. He's freezing and confused, and gets to his feet to brush the snow off as quickly as he can. Shivering and looking around wildly, he speaks to seemingly no one in particular. The last thing he remembers is jumping into a teleporter, which while it could have taken him somewhere lse shouldn't have claimed his armor. His voice is deep and steady, though, he's not panicking yet.

"D, status report." Nothing. No response, not even a stirring inside his head. He tries again. "Delta, hop to. What's going on?"

Nothing, and now he seems tense. "Delta?" His voice shakes as panic sets in. "Delta!" He touches his head and the implant is still there, but Delta is gone. His gaze is now wild as he looks around at the others, these strangers.

What is he supposed to do now?

the base

No stranger to military bases or protocol, York doesn't question their treatment at the base. Detainment is the best that they could have asked for, really, he acknowledges that, but when it's clear that the Cetagandans don't know how the strangers have arrived any more than they do he falls quiet. What comes next? Do they expect him to assist in the conflict? He's not willing to, not yet anyway.

He walks through the base in a fog, sometimes reaching out to his left to check if anything or anyone is there. He has no trackers and no D to advise him and it shakes him more than he wants to admit. His reaching hand may bump into you, for which he'll apologize lightly and gesture to his face.

The medbay is also a place he recognizes and knows well, and he submits to the examination without complaint. They prod his scars and examine his bad eye and take great interest in the back of his head where the neural implant is placed, and that'll be when he speaks again, asking a million questions. Is it intact? Could it have been deactivated when he arrived? Can they get it working again? The medical personnel don't know, as it's so foreign to them, and York's manner deteriorates further. He needs it to be working, he needs D. He doesn't know how to be alone anymore.

the exotics room

York is now looking shell-shocked, his good eye staring out into nothingness just like the bad one. He changes into the base fatigues and follows along at mealtimes but hardly eats, for now seemingly unappreciative of the comforts they're being offered. Sometimes he doubles forward with his head in his hands, shaking. He feels empty, hollow, like a part of him is gone.

He clearly needs help, this is more than being scared of someplace new.

[standsentinel]

It's after one of the exquisitely prepared mealtimes that York has a visitor by his bunk. The major's had time enough to process -- or at least compartmentalize -- his own change in circumstances. He'd heard the younger man's panicked voice in the middle of their arrival, and the parallels to Joker's frantic cries to EDI in the wake of the Crucible's blast front were all too clear. Now, seeing him curled in on himself like this, moving like an automaton when given direction, the parallels are too sharp to ignore.

(Shepard, he reflects, would probably already have the kid's life story and be busy with an impromptu side trip to get just the exact part to fix whatever's up with him.)

Still, Shepard's not here, and he is. The young man is some sort of military, he could piece together that much. He pulls up a chair, hunkers with his knees apart and his hands clasped between them, and musters up a little bit of Major Alenko, commander and babysitter of biotic spec ops and their complicated woes. "Ah, I'm guessing the last thing you want to do is talk about it," he says. "But I think you probably need to. I'll take a sitrep, if you're up to giving it."

the exotics room

[asafepairofhands]

By now, Ratchet's starting to remember things his overworked processor--brain, dammit, missed when he was first sitting in the freezing wind. The memories are weirdly fuzzy, his recall imperfect, but some things stand out strangely, faces and voices in the disorienting whirl of snow and cold.

"Hey," Ratchet says, his voice hoarse as he looks down at York--who seems to be even more badly disoriented than he is, which is impressive. He reaches out, fingertips brushing the soft fabric covering York's hunched shoulder. He drops to one knee to get a slightly better look at York's face between his palms, his own brow furrowing.

"Who's Delta?"

a cold welcome

[norms]

The first thing he remembers is being glad he didn't forget to put on his shoes that day. It varies depending on where they are, so to wind up in the snow on land... He doesn't like it, but there are a lot of other things he doesn't particularly like either; it doesn't make a difference if it's one over the other. All he can do is wrap his arms around himself and look around, try to get an idea of where he and all these other people might be. Egil doesn't recognize it at all, it's definitely not home, and he sort of jerks around in York's direction when he suddenly has a fit, wary but making an effort to be concerned. (Sorin would have been proud. Probably.)

"What's a Delta?" That's a polite question to ask, right?

a week in;

[infailtration]

As the days stretch on, York gets worse. He keeps reaching out with his mind for Delta and coming up with nothing. Sometimes he'll start talking to himself and then in the silence remember: it's only to himself. He can't sleep for the flashing lights behind his eyelids and the sudden earsplitting crashes he hears, can't hold still for the strange tingling sensations that crawl over his skin. Every now and then there's a rushing sensation, like he's falling or being shocked. It's overwhelming. He knows there's nothing there, that he's seeing things, hearing things, feeling things, that it's just the inactivity of the implant causing his brain to freak out but he also can't stop it and it's driving him slowly insane. His mood swings wildly, and he doesn't know how to control that either... it's sheer force of will that keeps him quiet in the exotics room, an awareness of what's happening and a determination not to disturb the others further. But sometimes he forgets where he is and the panic is so sharp and intense that he'll call for Delta again -- everyone is probably sick of him. He's sick of him. But there's nothing to be done for it. No one's brought him the scans yet either, but he knows the implant has deactivated.

Tonight, he cracks. He's so worn out, worn down, alone and hollow and frustrated and miserable that he can't keep it inside anymore. It's the middle of the night and he'll wake the others if he screams so he just cries into his pillow, feeling like a child. Pathetic -- he's supposed to be a soldier. He was a soldier. But all he wants to do now is give up and bash his head into the wall until it all stops. Is this what Wash felt like? He feels even worse for abandoning his friend, now, for taking down the MOI with him still in psych. How did he get past this? He's changed, for certain, but he survived... But even not knowing the details, Wash had his implant for only days. York's had his for years. It might be different. He doesn't have the energy to get up and ask the other man, even if he thought he'd get a useful answer. He doesn't.

Fuck, he needs help.

egil | original | ota

[norms]

the base

[ He's okay with the snow. He's almost okay with the base and whoever all these people are leading them around, but what he's not okay with are the women dressed in lab coats. Egil protests almost immediately—loudly and a bit too violently when he's expected to follow them off somewhere. A few of the others who'd gone before him didn't seem to have an issue with it, but how could they know what they would do? How could they know what people like them have done? He's shaking when the soldiers drag him out, and when they finally dump him back into the room, there's a oddly wild look to him. He's paler than usual, a light sheen of sweat dampening the hair at the nape of his neck, and he scrambles into one of the corners, crouching low and watching the others sharply before he sinks down and slides his arms over his head. ]

« They're going to kill us. » [ It's mostly a mumble, the Icelandic rough on his tongue, and if anyone wanders close enough, he's just going to look up at them with a scowl. ] How can you believe them? [ The words are bitter, though it's mostly a front to hide just how terrified he is. ] They say we're exotic, but what are they?

the exotics room

[ Adjusting is easier than he feels it should be, but things have certainly been worse. He's used to the cold, hard ground and the sounds of the fiare close, a warmer comfort he might have appreciated than all of this pristine nonsense. The only thing he's marginally grateful for is the solidity of the ground compared to the roll of the speranţă, and it's around lunchtime that he finally drags himself from the edge of the bed he's shoved himself into. There's a routine he's picked up on, at least, and that makes whoever they are predictable enough that Egil is almost comfortable with it. Almost. The food, however, isn't anything he's ever seen before in his life, and a questionable look passes over his face, foregoing any utensils that might be readily available and inspecting it with his fingers. He jabs at something and watches it melt, frowning at it.

He glances at the person closest to him. ] Are you really going to put that in your mouth?

[ Egil doesn't know how long it's been since he'd last eaten. At this point, he's having a difficult time remembering what that might have looked like, but he's sure it'd been better than this weird thing. Anyway, he's not having any of it, and he crosses his arms with a huff. ]

The base

[theyfear]

They won't.

[Darkness, he was aware of, power, just as known to him, but to the magnitude that he'd watched unfold before his eyes, felt course through his body, it was all unexpected. He'd chosen to let the sun take him from this world, but Shkelgim had brought him back, burnt and not the man he had been, never again that man. He had healed, quickly, stood in the shadows to witness his son grow into a man, leaving only after he'd lost Ingeras to old age.

Years passed and he'd felt hope again, only to blink and be pulled to a place that was far more advanced than the world he'd been in. He didn't question its legitimacy, but he did the purpose of it all.

Military. Efficient.]

I offer you my word, for what it is worth. I mean you no harm. [Vlad sits on the edge of the bunk assigned to him, giving the young man his space, knowing not to crowd.] But they won't kill us.

If they wanted us dead, we would be already. They've given us a place to rest, care.

[Then, because he believes honesty builds a stronger bond and that he'll need allies here.]

That doesn't mean we should trust them. They call us exotics, which implies an air of mystery, and when people are curious, they prod and study.

daryl dixon | the walking dead | ota.

[pigsfeet]

a. WELCOME TO BARRAYAR.

It's hot and chaotic in a hospital that hasn't seen air conditioning in over a year. The air is humid, muggy in the middle of summer, and then it's not. The skin on Daryl's face prickles-- the tears still on his face cool at an alarming rate. His unsleeved arms begin to shiver. He's pretty sure he's never been this cold.

He sees he's not alone. There are others caught in the cold darkness. He searches for a familiar face, and finds none. Standing sullen and angry, he watches as the soldiers gather, guns raised, and keeps his head down. He knows when to wait for an opportunity.

As cold and angry as he is, this is a good distraction. It takes his mind off what just happened back in Georgia. This is cold, terrifying, but it's not Grady, it's not the gun in his hand, the sight of her bleeding out on the floor. He keeps trudging onward.

He sees someone trip in the deep snow, and catches them before they fall completely. "Watch it," is all the comfort he can muster.

b. HOME BASE.

The little room they're set up in is creepy in its cleanliness. Daryl hasn't seen anything like this in years. It shouldn't goddamn exist.

He sits in a corner like a caged animal, hackles raised, waiting for an opportunity to strike. He doesn't answer any of the guards' questions, facing them with a complete silence, and doesn't ask any of his own. But it's clear he's listening, watching, waiting, for anyone careful enough to look. He doesn't have the most welcoming demeanor, sitting there alone, head bowed and expression twisted in a dark glare.

When the guards and scientists finally leave, he gets up, and begins checking the walls. He runs his fingers over them, climbs up on tables and bets to pat down the ceilings, looks under the beds. He's clearly searching for something, and doing so with a stubborn efficiency.

c. EXOTICS OR BUST.

When they're all herded in for a 'checkup', that, Daryl thinks, is the end. He waits in the back, ready for them to start opening people up. It doesn't happen the way Daryl expects. Whatever they're doing, whatever they want, it's clearly something bigger than just food.

That just means it's worse.

He watches the line of people get called in for 'tests', and he studies the room. "Ain't no easy exits," he mutters. "They know their shit. Done this before."

[infailtration]

York is ahead of Daryl in line for the examinations, and hears the other man muttering. He turns so he can see the stranger with his good eye. "At least they don't seem to be hurting anybody, they're all coming out alright."

Darkstalker | Wings of Fire | OTA

[threemoons]

A. Welcome to Barrayar

It was cold. It was cold and there was snow and if his father had somehow found a way to get him to the Ice Kingdom Darkstalker was never going to forgive him. Not that there weren't already a million reasons he hated Arctic, but this was certainly near the top of the list. He knew his father had wanted to get rid of him since the day he hatched, he just never expected he would actually do it, especially if it meant using magic. Which he must have done, because there was no other explanation for how Darkstalker wound up here.

He started prowling around the area, which was when he noticed all the scavengers. He'd never seen to many in one place, and none in the wild before. They seemed bigger than the ones they'd had at his school.

"Well at least I won't starve," he muttered to himself, poking one of them experimentally with his claws.

B. The Exotics Room

Darkstalker entered the room with a haughty glare that would make his father proud. They honestly expected to keep him trapped here like some scavenger. The nerve. He'd already protested but the scavengers here were suprisingly well armed and for some reason he couldn't breathe fire or use any of his powers. So all he could do was follow their instructions and wait.

He went straight for the far end of the room, taking stock as he went. Twelve bunks, and only nine captives. No reason to let the extras go to waste. If they were going to be there a while, he was going to make it as comfortable for himself as he could. Darkstalker stopped at the second to last bunk in the row and started shoving it towards the one in the corner, pointedly ignoring if either had been claimed already. There was loud scraping noise as the furniture moved across the floor.

[infailtration]

There's a dragon.

Probably just some kind of alien, but it sure looks like a dragon to York, which is almost enough to make him wonder if he's dreaming all of this. Almost -- the cold sure is real enough, his fingertips turning blue as his thin undersuit does nothing to keep him warm.

And then the dragon's heading for him, and prodding him with a claw. Did it just talk? It did. About food. "Hey! Watch it with those!"

Lapis Lazuli | Steven Universe | OTA

[mirrortide]

[A: Exotic room]

Well, it's not the barn, and Peridot isn't around. Still, Lapis pointedly refuses to put anything on her body that isn't the crop top and skirt she's already wearing. Which means she's in bare feet. Still. It doesn't look like that's about to change either with the way that she completely disregards the clothing offered. Instead, she just sort of flits from one spot to another, looking around restlessly.

For the record, she's not blue because she's cold. That part is completely natural. She is cold though, judging from the way she's walking around with her arms around herself and shivering now and again.

[B: Meal time]

She doesn't need to eat, so she doesn't. It seems to be expected of her though, but Lapis just sort of helplessly looks around to anyone else who may be eating as well. "Do you want this? I'm not putting it in my body." Maybe she'll feel hunger eventually, but right now she's more or less none the wiser.

steven mealiverse.

[pigsfeet]

Daryl hasn't touched any of the food on his plate either. As far as he's concerned, the way the blue girl is staring down at her food with disgust is smart. These people clearly have the resources to dose their food with whatever they want, and scruples aren't even a question. If they can, they will.

"Nah," he says, and then, "dunno what the hell it is."

Kaidan Alenko | Mass Effect | ota

[standsentinel]

Arrival

He can feel the space in his perceptions where his biotics should be like the biggest and most phantom of phantom limbs -- an inexplicable absence even while everything else is reporting in as all systems green. (Although his toes and fingers might start shading into the blue if he's not careful.) Even at rest, he ought to be feeling the interplay between the eezo in his own body and what's in the world around him, subtle resonances between himself, the other biotics, the drive core of the ship... all the sensations he'd never even thought of, much less put a name to, until they were gone.

He'd had the amp offline before, but had attributed the dislocated feeling as much to the fact that he was on amazing painkillers following having seven shades of shit shaken out of him by a murderous AI-controlled mech. Now, mostly-hale and reasonably-hearty as he stands in an unexpected winter's woods, he can feel it all the more strongly.

The trees look like Earth evergreens, the mountains could easily be the Rockies, but he left an Earth that was smoking ruins, where even the countryside was choked with ash and death and the rubble of small towns taken out with a passing strike from a Reaper's main battery. One hand reaches automatically to call up his omni-tool's display, plans for amp diagnostics and comm broadcasts jostling for priority, only to find another absence: the omni-tool is missing. "What the shit," quoth Major Alenko, standing in the snow in nothing more than his Alliance duty uniform and a thick cloak of befuddled alarm that thickens still more as he realizes he's not alone. "Who's over there?"

Base

The differences between 'under arrest' and 'detained' are appreciable only on a longer timeframe than the one Kaidan's found himself in. In the here and now, they both result in a loss of freedom and a scarcity of answers, it's just that the latter one suggests it would be rude to try and escape. That 'detained' also neatly dispenses with the need to adhere to any rights like access to legal counsel... well, he'd be wryly impressed by their tactics, if he wasn't currently caught in the middle of them.

Kaidan's strategy seems to be to retreat into a watchful calm that might well be downright irritating for a hotter tempered member of the group to watch. He's polite to the guards and medics, trades questions answered for questions asked, and seems to be doing his level best to be as unremarkable as it's possible for an exotic to be. His medical scans betray his efforts, however, as the cybernetics of his biotic amp and the haptic implants in his fingertips provide enough to catch some medical interest all on their own, even without the mysterious shadows of the eezo nodes that nestle all along his nervous system.

It doesn't take too many question-trades for him to figure out that these people have no idea what biotics are, much less the witch's christening gift of his L2 implant. Paired with what seem to be exclusively energy weapons among the soldiers and the unfamiliar state of Cetaganda, and he's left wondering if this is yet another lost colony situation like the Manswell Expedition. "So, ah," he wonders, testing out a new question. "Does your empire still have contact with Earth?"

Bunkroom

The decor may be creepy in its perfection, but the food is slowly convincing Kaidan, who apparently retains his biotic's metabolism despite the amp's failure, that their captor-hosts may be trying to domesticate their new exotics by means of food rewards. Polite requests for comm network access being even more politely declined, he's left with trying to make sense of his situation based on observation alone. His fellow prisoner-guests are certainly the most varied pool of individuals, and the near-certainty that they're being recorded doesn't outweigh the utility of getting to know them. So, in between the various interviews from the Cetagandans, Kaidan turns up with a crooked smile and the reflection that "I really need to see if they'll give us a deck of cards or something... but what's your story? I'm earthborn, myself."

bunkroomies.

[pigsfeet]

Daryl has been pacing their pretty cage for a while now, clearly searching for something. He runs his hands along the sleek walls, tests the strength of the locked doors, and pulls at every latch and rung he can find. Nothing seems to be giving him what he's looking for.

(He's looking for materials to make a shiv, but he hopes these stuffy pricks have their heads too far up their asses to guess his aims.)

He doesn't look up from the door handle he's trying to disconnect from the door when one of his fellow 'exotics' asks a perfectly innocuous question. Perfectly innocuous, and perfectly ridiculous. "I look like a damn astronaut to you?"

Ratchet | OTA

[asafepairofhands]

{welcome to barrayar.}
Ratchet wakes to fire.

He feels like he's being scorched all over, a burning, numbing pain. It's long, disorienting moments before he can clear his vision and his whole body feels strange as he stares up at the sky, trying to reorient himself. The last thing he remembers is being on his shuttle, closing in on Drift's signal... and now he's here, and whatever this is goes beyond mere disorientation. He feels raw and hypersensitive all over, his head aching, and he realizes abruptly that he can feel his chest rising and falling, air searing his--

Lungs?

He sits up so fast he's nearly sick, nausea rippling out from his belly in waves as he feels the wind whip around him, blowing snow into his face. He can feel each flake against his cheeks like a hot spark blown back from a welding torch and he realizes abruptly that the burning sensation he's feeling all over is cold. He's cold, because he's sitting on an unfamiliar planet in a t-shirt and fatigue pants in the middle of a snowdrift and there's frozen water against his... skin. He can feel his breath getting faster and faster as he stares down at himself, flexing his painfully stiff hands and feeling his stomach roll again as he takes in the thick, taut scars wrapped around each wrist. He watches his fingertips tremble and it takes him a moment to realize it's because his whole body is shaking, wracked in long, rippling waves as he fights the urge to curl into a tight ball there on the ground, his teeth clattering together uncomfortably before he clenches his jaw. Shivering. He's shivering, and he just sits there for another few seconds, watching the tiny hairs on his arms prickle uselessly before he hears noise around him and he finally kicks his brain into gear.

He looks around, his vision weirdly blurry, his HUD disorientingly absent, but before he can do much else he's being heaved to his feet, a sudden light blinding him as he's frog-marched off with the others, trying not to look as terrified as he feels.


{the base}
The first blast of heat when he's inside dizzies him, but once he starts to defrost properly he's oriented enough that he can think again, and what he's coming up with is not comforting in the slightest. He recognizes a military base when he sees one and is relaxed not at all--his voice is hoarse and clipped as he answers questions with the bare minimum of information possible, since, oh yeah, I was a fifteen-foot person made entirely of metal and I'm five million years old doesn't seem like the wisest thing to divulge right off the bat. He doesn't sleep.

He's even more familiar with the medical bay when he's taken there and he's more focused than he has been since he was picked up, his head twisting, trying to take in all the equipment by sight without asking any questions. He doesn't argue with the physical, watching himself being poked and prodded with as much interest as the medic performing the exam. It's strange, but the clinical setting and the bizarrely universal scent of hospital is what finally really grounds him, and he's clear-eyed and alert when they funnel him into quarantine with the rest of the "exotics," as they're apparently being called. Ratchet is aware that they don't know the half of it, and he hopes they don't find out anytime soon.


{the exotics room}
Eating is weird.

There are more observations Ratchet has collected during his stay here, but that's the one most present in his mind. It certainly isn't the weirdest thing about being an organic, but it's up there. Still, he manages it, knowing that the alternative is passing out at some point at best, and he slowly starts to acclimate to it, same as he does for everything else. He still doesn't answer many questions, but he sure as hell pays attention to everyone else if they do within earshot, trying to gather as much information as he can. If you catch him looking at you, that's probably why.

[mirrortide]

Lapis has been getting a lot of stares. Which makes sense, because, well, she's blue. Only she really wishes people wouldn't, because it's really, really annoying. Enough so that she's had enough of it, and when she catches him staring at her, she marches up to him.

"Yes. I'm blue. Do you have a problem with it?" Okay, she also might be getting frustrated too.

washington | red vs. blue | ota

[protocol]

[ ooc: will match format, tag me as you will and drop me a line or @ me in the discord group if got an idea that doesn't work for any of these, or something. o/ ]

ARRIVAL // EN ROUTE TO BASE

[ Wash is cooperating, for the most part.

Waking up face first in the snow wearing nothing but a body suit that's meant to go under much more protective armor isn't exactly the best morning he's ever had, but he's had worse, in some ways. The thermal layer is enough to keep him from freezing to death, but not enough to prevent a great deal of discomfort, and it had taken him far too long to struggle to his feet, to fight past the throbbing headache enough to try and take stock of his surroundings. There's just -- snow, mountains and foothills, none of it recognizable, a feeling deep in his stomach that leaves him sick and queasy and feeling like something's gone terribly, terribly wrong.

That was a while ago, now, and that feeling hasn't gone away. It takes effort to not sway a little with every step, and Wash finds his vision swimming in front of his eyes every now and then, just forces himself to ignore it and press on. When those soldiers had arrived, when they'd been given orders to escort them back to base, wherever that might be, Wash hadn't really felt like cooperating -- but they have weapons and he doesn't even have his fucking armor, can't even really remember what happened before he got here, and he's smart enough to know when he should pick a fight and when he should play along. There are others here, others being escorted along with him that had seemed just as confused and uneasy, and maybe they aren't any friends of his, either, but he'd rather be talking to one of them than one of their escorts.

He lags behind purposefully in their little escort group, or maybe he moves to the side, hangs out somewhere near the back -- either way he's found some way to move up next to you out of earshot from those soldiers, maybe while you're all still on the move or maybe after they've called for a stop for some reason or another. ]

Do you know what you're in for? [ It'd sound like a light-hearted quip and it kind of is, but there's something too dry about the way he says it, bitter and sharp. ]

BASE // MEDBAY

No -- No, don't. I'll just --

[ Fresh from a physical examination, Wash is still a little off-balance, not exactly recovered from whatever It was that brought him here ( or whatever it was they did to him to bring him here ). Some assistant is trying to help him out of the room, to offer him somewhere to rest before he's escorted somewhere to stay, and Wash is shaking his head, pushing them away, no, I'm fine, I'm fine. Those last words he snaps a little too sharply, the poor assistant backing away immediately into the examination room in response, and Wash has half a mind to maybe apologize or say something, but, never mind. He is fine. He's fine.

He just shakes his head, brings a hand up to pinch at the bridge of his nose. According to the physician on staff, everything about his vitals looks normal, other than some obvious stress and tension, would you please relax, sir, but it's fucking hard to relax when there's bright lights and clean gleaming walls and people in lab coats tapping their pens on their clipboards, and.

Focus, Wash, Focus. Exotics. They'd called you an exotic. They're called Cetagandans, the Cetagandan Empire, and all the other words had been too alien for him to follow. He'd wracked his brain searching his memories of all the star map's he's studied but he's sure not heard of an empire. Wash tries to sit down, but he's too agitated, too nervous, something still twisting hard in his chest whenever someone in a lab coat walks past, and there's -- that facepaint. Strange. Foreign. Alien.

He's just leaning against a wall off to one side in the little waiting area by the medbay. He's not exactly unapproachable, he just seems -- more than a little stressed, right now, and he'll talk if you say something to him. ]

EXOTICS ROOM // WILDCARD

[ Feel free to run into him anywhere in the exotics room! You can probably find him staring and frowning at the fatigues he's been given by the Cetagandan soldiers, staring at the well-prepared food, or staring and not-quite-engaging with any of the Cetagandans that come by.

Basically he's going to do a lot of staring warily at things. ]

exotics room, first day;

[infailtration]

[ York and Wash are too far apart in the storm to notice one another. On opposite ends of the line as they're hustled to medical. But the exotics room is another story. York was cold in just his undersuit so he's already put on the Cetagandan fatigues, and is now looking around at the others; the pacing blue girl, the dragon moving furniture, and the hillbilly trying to break everything. He focuses on everyone in turn until he comes to Wash.

...there's no way.

Is there?

York squints his good eye, then opens it wide to stare. It is him. Older, more scarred, and with a wary expression that York's never seen on him before, but that's Wash. He feels a pang of guilt as he gets to his feet and works his way across the room -- he left. He left his friend behind in a horrible state. There's no making up for that, but... Wash is here.

Maybe he's not alone. If the other man can forgive him. ]

Duv Galeni | The Vorkosigan Saga | come harass a historian nerd

[komarran]

The Base

There's a strange feeling being on a planet he's spent a good portion of his adult life on only to have it feel very... different. The difference being of several decades. Pinpointing the date becomes trivial as soon as he realizes his captors are from Cetaganda. An occupation on Barrayar of this sort could only have taken place at one point in time and he hopes this is some bizarre, vivid dream brought on by a long night of reading historical documents.

That theory starts to dissipate the longer he's guided by the guards and by the time he's brought into the medbay, it's vanished entirely. How in the hell is time travel possible? Never mind that he was five wormholes away from this damn planet.

If he's truly in the middle of the Cetagandan occupation of Barrayar, Duv knows one thing. He needs to keep his damn mouth shut. Never before had he thought academic knowledge of a particular period could be so dangerous. It wouldn't be as simple as finding his way out of the compound and slipping into Barrayar's. His accent could easily ping the few that might have heard what a Komarran sounds like and land him into even more trouble.

He comes out of the medbay glancing around at his surroundings with a careful eye. He's walking around in a moment of history and he's torn between wanting out of this place and documenting every second he's here for a personal account of the Cetagandan side of the occupation. He's not the only 'exotic' here either.

Curiosity gets the better of him as he approaches his fellow captives to ask, "Excuse me, do you mind telling me where you're from?" Are they all from the surrounding area or from farther reaches of the Nexus? Only one way to find out.

The Exotics Room

Cetagandans. He manages to withhold rolling his eyes as he stares at the artistically prepared food. Trust them to add frivolity to eating in the middle of an occupation. Routine for them, he supposes. The Cetagandan Empire of now was different than the one he dealt with at the embassy and at least there's no assassination squads to handle this time around. Yet anyway.

"You'd think they'd want to spend their energy elsewhere," he grumbles as he settles at a table with his meal.

[standsentinel]

"Maybe," says the mid-30s man across the table from him, "Or maybe showing off that they have the energy to spend on making military rats look pretty is part of the game. 'Look how advanced our culture is we can devote time to making MREs look beautiful' kind of thing." Regardless of their artistry, the large assembly of food on Kaidan's plate is being put away with a methodical rotation through the different sides and mains.

He's exchanged a few words with Duv by now, given a brief summary of himself -- Earthborn, military, but from an Earth and an interstellar military that's never heard of Cetaganda, Komarr, Barrayar or any of this. Beyond that, he seems to have been splitting his time between taking the measure of his fellow exotics and the guards with long stretches of meditation.