(open) crash into me

[whatsupcroc]

Date & Time: Mid-afternoon Sunday, May 5th
Location: The Hold and Housing Complex
Characters: All who wish to be in the vicinity!
Summary: The Initiative asked for the Housing Complex to be evacuated starting early morning on 5/5, in preparation for the expected landing of the spaceship stolen from the United Earth. The landing goes horribly wrong when an undiscovered bomb detonates onboard the ship, causing partial engine failure. The ship proceeds to be crash landed into the Housing Complex; no lives, however, are lost.

Warnings: Spaceship crash landings it's all horrible!
Notes: Respond in action tags or prose, as you please!

The ship breaks cloud-cover as a spot of light in the dreary skies, leaving behind the beauty of sunlight above the broken cloud layer as it continues to descend. With the Initiative having instigated an evacuation of the area ahead of time, just in case, those watching in the light drizzle may find it an interesting sight to behold.

Doubtlessly, the United Earth, from its great distance, may have also found it interesting.

The first sign of something going wrong is an explosion visible from the ground. People who hear it might startle; the ship itself goes from a smooth, controlled flight path to one wobbly and filled with dark, flaming smoke. The whine of its remaining engine is slower to reach the ground, though the ship itself seems to pick up a spiraling speed, still controlled to those familiar with watching things that fly come crashing down to the ground.

The Initiative members on the ground are calling for people to get back and take cover. Inside the main Hold, one man at the transport pads hears his radio blast to life and swallows past his own fear, glancing at the active pad waiting to pull in another unlucky soul.

When the ship hits the Housing Complex, it demolishes the upper levels, though the force with which it hits doesn't seem to be the same as what it should be. Combined telekinetic buffering and excellent piloting from a former Guardian of the Universe Galaxy keeps damage to a catastrophic minimum.

Welcome to the fallout. What will you do from here?

Comments

[motioned]

[...No, there's no way he wouldn't have checked to make sure she was alright yet if he knew her. Not her. And suddenly, the world that had seemed so chaotic a moment ago seems even moreso. Not thinking about hiding her reaction from him, she plants a hand to her mouth, looking down at the ground for a second, horrified, trying to rationalize this. No, this couldn't be happening, anyone but him, this couldn't be real, this wasn’t fair—

She realizes, after a moment, that he can see her entire reaction, and she stops, dropping her hand from her face. What is she doing? She should be trying to help him, not troubling him. It takes her a bit to compose herself fully, but then there's a smile, gentle and polite and forced. Her voice is calm and light.]

Ah, s-sorry again! I just, I was surprised because you look a lot like a description someone I know gave me of his friend. Do you know Oz Vessalius at all?

[retraced]

[Her reaction sobers him instantly. There's still the absolute confusion that accompanies arrival in an unfamiliar place, the awkward sensation that he should be seeing if everyone is safe and getting away from the destruction that he'd been running towards despite not knowing what happened. But it's too vivid of an expression to look away from, and he finds himself staring in that concerned way that he does when he thinks that no one is looking at him. He's hurt her running into her, he thinks. But before he can ask if she's okay, she says the one name that can break him out of any heavy thoughts.]

Oz? He - [He takes a step closer.] Wait, he gave you my description? When? How long ago was he here?

[motioned]

[She nods, and that urgency in his voice is enough to add a touch of truth to her smile. Same Gilbert deep down, of course, no matter the differences in memory. There's an intake of breath. Just keep it up, she tells herself, just for a few more minutes.]

He's still here! He's - here, do you have the tablet they gave you when you first arrived? I can show you how to get in touch with him. He can't be far, we all had to evacuate even before the explosion!

[And with that, she's wondering why he didn't come on the first of the month like everyone else has, but it's not important enough to focus on.]

[retraced]

[He's here. That's all he needs to hear to relax visibly, his shoulders slumping and his racing heart calming down enough to keep his head from spinning off entirely. He takes in a deep breath and keeps listening, but...after her first sentence, the rest of it just sort of bounces off of his thick skull and disappears into thin air.]

Tab...let? I'm not sure what you mean.

[motioned]

[She pulls her own out of her bag, holding it up so he can see.]

This. They should have given you one when you got here, did they? If not, you can use mine.

[She takes a breath. It shouldn't take long to explain this to him, and then she could leave. She can do this, she bets.]

[retraced]

[He tilts his head to get a better look at it, coming to stand over at her side.]

They? You mean - back there?

[He gestures back in the direction of the hold. It hasn't even occurred to him yet that he hasn't asked for her name.]

They told me to evacuate. What do you do with it?

[motioned]

Yeah, them! The Initiative, that's what they're called. And the tablet, it's like...

[She presses a few buttons, pulling up a list of names, and scrolls down to Oz's.]

You see how I did that? You're gonna want to get your tablet if you haven't yet, and do that same thing, and then touch down on his name. That should call him, and then you can talk to him.

[retraced]

W-wait!

[All of that went way too fast for him. He reaches over her shoulder and points at the screen.]

Words...how is it all moving like that?!

[motioned]

[She laughs, lightly, not much humor behind it.]

Oh, it's like - right, because you guys are from way in the past! It's a new kind of technology, it's called a touch screen. You touch the place you want it to go, and it goes there. So...

[She clicks back a page, where there's the option of going to the list of contacts. She points at the small icon, looking towards him to see if he's following.]

See the little picture there? You touch there, and it goes to a list of people. Then you just have to find Oz's name.

[retraced]

Way in the past...

[His head goes dizzy again, and he stumbles a little to one side before attempting to right himself and stare back down at the screen. Maybe if he looks at it long enough it'll make more sense.]

What year is it?

[motioned]

[Instinctively, she reaches out to steady him, making sure he's more centered before she goes on.]

It's 3313.

[She wants to leave, that's undeniable, but she doesn't want to leave him while he still needs answers, so she waits for him to digest that.]

[retraced]

[The year makes very little sense, but the sight of it against her assurance that it's far ahead enough in the future to make words appear on flat surfaces with the touch of a finger is clear enough. Somehow he's stumbled back through the Abyss, probably more than a hundred years this time. But Oz was here? How had they managed to end up in the same place? Had he changed? Had Gilbert been the one to be stuck in the flow of time while Oz surpassed him?

And if that were the case, what had happened to his incuse? Had it moved somehow?]

Oz...the person you met before. [His voice drops lower as he watches her hand on his arm.] How old was he?

[motioned]

Oh, we're friends! We talked, like, two days ago, and last time I checked he was fifteen. But if you're not so sure, you could check for yourself when you talk to him! [Another small laugh.]

[retraced]

[He sighs. Thank goodness.]

Ah...s-sorry. I didn't even ask yet. What's your name?

[motioned]

[She takes a moment, because that question makes her want to scream; he should know her name, because he should know her. But she takes a breath, in and out, and blinks, pretending she didn't hear initially. It should explain the pause, at least.]

Oh, sorry, I guess I got caught up in my thoughts for a second! I'm Ahiru. And you, I think he said your name was Gilbert, um, starts with an N, right? It's on the tip of my tongue!

[This all feels wrong, so wrong.]

[retraced]

Nightray.

[Something about this feels wrong, and of course he blames himself for whatever it is.]

Are you okay? I didn't hurt you before, did I?

[motioned]

No! No, no, you didn't hurt me.

[It's a little too fast and a little too forceful, but that's the last thing she wants him to think. And she makes up her mind then and there: he can never know they'd known each other before this world.]

Please don't worry about it, I'm fine. But I bet you want to go find him, right? He'll be so glad to see you, too. So I should probably leave you to it, unless you have any more questions.

[retraced]

[He has a thousand more questions, but there's something so dismissive about her words that he's sure he's offended her somehow. He bows his head in apology, his damp hat dripping rainwater onto the ground.]

Ah, right...thank you for all of your help, Ahiru.

[The name is unfamiliar to him; he doesn't say it exactly right.]

[motioned]

[It's been two and a half years since he last said her name like that, and it feels even more wrong to her than calling him Gilbert had. She can feel it, she's going to start to cry soon, so she nods and gives him a smile, wavering only slightly.]

Um, you should find an umbrella or something, okay? You wouldn't want to catch cold in this weather.

[She'll wait for some kind of confirmation before she goes.]

[retraced]

I will.

[He's frowning again, confused and concerned all at once, but he doesn't say anything else. Gilbert is terrible at reading a person's feelings, but something about this is telling him to leave before he makes things worse.

But an umbrella is the last thing on his mind. He turns and starts back for the burning building, running just as quickly as he had been before. Oz is here, but the horizon is still filling with smoke. He doesn't even think to ask her to use that tablet to try and get a hold of him; it's already forgotten for now.]

self indulgently nailing down her thought process here pls ignore

[motioned]

[She watches him run, taking care to keep her expression neutral until she can barely make him out. After that, it's not so hard to go somewhere unnoticed; in all the chaos, nobody's paying attention to where one girl goes off by herself.

It's only when she's convinced she's alone that the tears start. Stupid, stupid, it's so stupid to be this upset. Still, there's anger and fear and heartbreak and even once the initial bout of sorrow is gone, she can't stop herself from thinking. He was there, he was always there, this is wrong, this isn't right, unfair—

But the worst part, maybe, is minutes later, sitting alone in the rain, back braced against a building, praying nobody finds her, when she realizes it's not wrong at all. This is how it should be. He shouldn't have to remember. She knows how horrible some of the things that happened on that island were, and if he knew, wouldn't it only be a burden? And Oz shouldn't have to deal with his close friend having memories of a world he'd never been in. This is right. This is for the best for everyone except her.

He's better off with memories that don't include you, that voice in the back of her head says, and it's so true and real and undeniable that she has to bring her hand up to her mouth again, biting down on a knuckle to stop the noise of anguish. She looks up towards the sky, blinking through the rain, dropping her hand so she can dig her nails into the now drenched skirt of her dress. She wipes the water out of her face, taking a few deep breaths, though it doesn't do much to calm her.]

Stupid, stupid - what did I do? [The last bit is nearly wailed out before looking down again and burying her face in her hands, and she’s immediately glad nobody is around to hear her or see her. Selfish, selfish—

It’s a while before she can convince herself to leave this place.]