TEMPORAL TURBULENCE: BRAZIL&NORWAY

[initiatesnpc]

Date & Time: Brazil, 1200 A.D./Norway, 1201 A.D.
Location: Assorted
Characters: Alistair, Bariyan, Chloe, Martin Darkov, Natasha, Robin, Sark
Summary: Group #4's adventures spent lost in time.
Warnings: Violence? (notify Elle or Liz of anything else worthy of labeling)



The mission was set. Team members were given their equipment: The cloaking devices would acclimate to the area and disguise them based on the historical data pulled in. There was a weapons check: The Initiative was insistent about having those chosen weapons along for the ride. Four operatives were introduced as beacons: They would stay in contact with the Initiative and relay any alterations in plans until the mission was deemed a success. And it had to be a success, or disaster would be the only thing left.



1890 A.D.

There was a man, not very well-known as far as famous men go. A writer. His existence alone was not the significant factor in the timeline's disturbance, but his profession and his choice to tell a particular, peculiar story.

This man, the Initiative states, helped sow the seeds for modern time travel centuries before its prime. What was a captivating fiction in that man's time was the reality of today, and without his account of the Time Traveler, there was risk of the very existence of so much. The recruits absolutely have a stake in this.


To the export room — the massive, rather bare and bleak place where so many were to exit and put a stop to what was putting a stop to the writer's tale. It was as yet unclear, but the Initiative is certain they'll know it when they see it, that it will be revealed once their reluctant soldiers set foot on ancient soil.

One last check, one last insistence on the urgency of their task. One, final urging to avoid as direct an impact as possible without ruining their chances; keep your temporal footprint as light as you can.

Good luck. We're counting on you.


A flash, a bitten-back breath, a blink...The room was gone.

But this wasn't right.

Out of the many who were assigned, only seven remained. Seven, and an Initiative's operative, who was immediately aware of a problem. A big problem.


BRAZIL, 1200 A.D.

The village the eight found themselves in was in no way even close to the one they were targeting. Already, the cloaking devices were fumbling to find disguises to suit, lacking the historical data for an appropriate match for an undiscovered Brazil. Historically undiscovered, anyway; if the ghost city they had arrived in was anything to go by, humans were not strangers to this land.

But it was empty. Birdsong echoed off great stone structures, some decorated, some bare, but all vacant. There's a faint scent in the air of salt from an unseen but not-so-distant ocean, and a thick, heavy humidity causing a sweat right away.

Over six centuries too far back, the data relays. And no answer as to how to get back.



NORWAY, 1201 A.D.

The heat is very suddenly gone, replaced with a breath-stealing cold. There is snow to the ankles and a sharp wind blasting through. Mid-gust, the party has arrived in a land so far away from the last, but barely a blink away in time.

One whole year. The dismay in the operative's report cannot be disguised, nor was there any attempt to. Whatever was going on with the equipment back at the Hold was serious trouble.

Speaking of serious trouble. Unlike the first, there were no quiet and empty cities to wonder at; this frozen land was very much alive, filled with the scattered shapes of horses and ironclad men racing to a location unseen in this bone-chilling darkness. Flickers of firelight on metal, the loud whinny of a horse and a man's shout straining to echo far...Something was certainly up.

Comments

closed to chloe

[theguideless]

[IDC WHICH FORMAT YOU REPLY IN BTW ACTION OR PROSE IS FINE]

Really, it could've been a matter of making the right gesture to convince the strange natives of their wants to get water right away. But...but Martin wasn't very good with people. And any time any of them tried any sort of communication, it was taken as another sign or threat or...Hrugh. It was very frustrating and unsettling. He didn't like being observed with so much awe.

How many days had it been, again? Was it even going to matter anymore?

Was there ever a day not choked with sunlight and heat?

He was trying to keep his complaints to himself, but couldn't help but let out another, huffy exhale as he dunked a hollowed-out gourd into the stream. The water wasn't going to make him feel any better, he was sure; he was already sweating fit to fill an ocean.

"Nguh." How many days had it been, again?

[undeadarmies]

"You okay?"

Chloe stood on the edge of the stream, own gourd in hand as she glances from Martin and back to the water. She didn't know how long they had been here, but it felt like an eternity already.

The jungle was too everything, and as exciting as the prospect was of meeting tribes in the past, it eventually wore off. Ebbed away by the heat and humidity. She couldn't document this, she couldn't take how dark everything quickly got when night approached, and if she thought dealing with regular spirits was bad, having to listen to them scream at her in a language she couldn't understand wasn't much more fun.

Oh, right. There was also the whole worship thing. Fun...

She brushed a strand of hair off of her face. "Other than drowning in your own sweat, I mean."

[theguideless]

"Uh—?"

Martin's head lifted up pretty quickly at the sound of Chloe's voice, instantly embarrassed. People included group members, of course; he wasn't much good with any of it. And it was hard to make heads or tails of a person until he could frame him or her in his mind as someone he already knew. He was still working on that, in her respect.

He shook himself out of his dumb stare and leaned back in his crouch a little, shoulders going up.

"Oh, I'm...fine," he said, watching the water as if it were extremely important to. "Sorry. If I'm taking too long..."

[undeadarmies]

A smile spread across her face, soft and comforting. Martin reminded Chloe of Derek in a way, minus the gruff mannerisms and general waves of hate for most people. So he wasn't exactly a carbon copy, but it was the awkwardness.

"You're not!" Her eyebrows furrowed as she turned to stare into the water as well, slightly embarrassed by the way her voice rose. "You're not taking too long. I just know that the heat... It's pretty gross."

He wasn't the only awkward one here, really. At least she wasn't stuttering, that would have been embarrassing.

[theguideless]

"Oh..."

It was already warm enough without Martin's face heating up, but the typical flush of embarrassment was right on time for the start of a conversation. His mouth tugged, trying to emulate the smile offered him, but failing spectacularly as his gaze flickered up and down and up again her way. People problems. And, apparently, girl people problems. He'd hardly know the difference right on the spot, however.

"Ye-yeah, it is..." He swallowed, lifting the gourd up and watching water drip off the sides. "I...I've never been in a hot place before. Or someplace so bright." His breath was exaggerated, as though trying to croak out a laugh. "I thought...the place we were at was really bright..."

[undeadarmies]

Someplace so bright? Shifting her gourd to her hip, Chloe held one hand over her eyes as she glanced up. It was pretty bright here, the world still unmarked by things such as pollution and global warming. She wondered if that meant this place would be even hotter in her time, if she were to come here.

"Do you come from some place where it's dark?" The idea of different worlds was still a hard concept to grasp. Just the fact that there had to be multiple Earths was enough to blow her mind. And here she thought that learning she was a necromancer and that she would be hunted by the Edison Group was going to end up as the strangest thing in her life. Apparently zombies paled in comparison to multiple dimensions. "Although you're right," she said with a soft laugh. "It's really bright here. Beautiful, though."

[theguideless]

His eyes dropped quickly at the gentle laugh, stomach doing a little flip. He nearly dumped the whole lot of water he'd collected, half-tilting the thing as if to dunk it in again, but...No, that would be stupid; it was already full. So he could but hold it until he figured out what to do next.

Beautiful, huh...?

"Uh, well..." He squinted at the shifting colors reflected in the water. "More like...the sun isn't...so big. I guess. Big or hot. But...I don't usually — I mean, Darkovs work...in the dark. So..."

Martin finally decided on just setting the thing down, freeing up hands to slip into the water for themselves. His shirt was practically glued to his arms and back; he was trained to never expose skin if he could help it, and he was loathe to start, heat or no heat. And with all that heat, well...

He wasn't the most fragrant of group members, let's just say.

"So I guess...that's why it's more different. I guess."

[undeadarmies]

"In the dark?" She made a face as she asked, her nose wrinkling on the word "dark" in particular. The funny thing about this place was, as bright as it could be in the day, once night hit... It was awful. The dark had always been a constant source of fear for her, and even though she knew why now, it didn't make things better. "What kind of work do you do that it has to be in the dark exactly?"

Shifting again, Chloe placed the gourd on the ground and sat down close to the bank. She leaned over to untie her shoes and pull off her socks, sliding her feet into the water. It was too hot not to, really.

As for however Martin smelled, well... Spending a lot of time in close quarters with a werewolf in puberty helped her ignore it for the most part.

[theguideless]

"It's, uh..."

Martin wound up watching the menial task of stripping shoes and socks with a bit more attention than it really allotted; some the others stripped clothes where they could now and then to combat the heat, of course. That, too, was weird to behold. In his own, childish way, he believed some of the silly, made-up stories about how humans really looked compared to something like him.

He expected something shocking, really. But it was just plain old skin. Skin he'd stared at well after they dipped into water and fragmented in the way moving water did.

He blinked.

Wait. What was he doing again?

He startled, straightening up from where he'd been kneeling, bent over for the sake of his hands; they dripped on his thighs as they hovered and were forgotten.

"Uh, sorry, it's. I...We—" He grimaced, shaking his head quickly to clear the mental fuzz of distraction. A loud exhale followed, and his hands found their way to the back of his neck, squeezing to press the remains of the water against it. "Darkovs...hunt monsters. And things. Bad things. It's what we're made for. Sorry, I..."

That was embarrassing.

[undeadarmies]

Chloe caught him watching, a flush of red crawling up her neck and settling on her face as she stared intently at the water instead. That was weird, right? Was it weird? She pressed her lips together in a thin line, eyebrows raised. No, that wasn't really a big deal. Maybe it was just weird for her to do something like that.

When he began talking again, she tilted her head to look at him, hoping the blush could be attributed to the heat instead of any embarrassment.

"Monsters?" She bit her lip then. "What sort of monsters?" She knew very little of what there was in her own world, still new to it all. Were there people who hunted people like herself? That thought was a bit terrifying. "You... You, uh, don't need to apologize for anything."

[theguideless]

His mouth opened and closed, pursed tight at her assurance. So many people said that — no need to apologize. Some in kinder words than others. He'd never acknowledged it as much of a habit or problem until Exsilium; it just made him feel stranger.

Martin almost said sorry again, but swallowed it.

"All sorts," he said, faltering a little. It seemed weird to stagger back to that; as if talking about monsters were at all good conversation to have with a human. Then again, he didn't know anything about what'd be proper, and it wasn't like he was in Olvoski anyhow, so...

"There's a lot. Back where I live. So we have to kill them, so people can stay alive."

[undeadarmies]

It probably was weird to talk about such things. Monsters. A few months ago, if anyone had tried to have a serious conversation with her like this, tried to say they actually hunted monsters, she'd probably have run away. Thought they were crazy. Maybe that was the funny thing, since that was exactly what happened to her.

"Are they all bad?" Her voice softened, the tone a mixture of curiosity and maybe sympathy. They all thought Derek was a monster too, because of what he was. But it wasn't true. "The monsters, that is. Do you just kill them because of what they are?"

[theguideless]

"Monsters are...monsters," Martin said, his voice raising slightly in a confused kind of way. Osprey had gone that angle before, questioned just what a monster happened to be. The boy shrugged his shoulders against it, brow furrowed. "They...poison animals. Kill the land. People...Humans, I mean. And we have to protect them. Or we'll die, too."

[undeadarmies]

"Sorry," she quickly apologized, turning to look back at the water, eyebrows furrowed. "I didn't mean to... Make it seem like you're doing anything wrong." Actually, it sounded like what he did was important. They were from different places, and not all the same rules applied.

"I know people who would be considered like monsters back home." Chloe carefully picked her words. She'd never really talked about these things with people who didn't already know it, and she didn't know how much would be too much. "It's kind of been my experience that regular people can be just as monstrous."

[theguideless]

The boy frowned, chewing on her words as he did the inside of his lip. With eyebrows raising in tandem with his shoulders, a deep breath, a slow exhale, he shook his head.

"I don't know anything about regular people," he said. "Not...Not supposed to know. It's not my business."

It seemed almost arrogant, he realized, and winced, quickly looking up. "Sorry. It's...just rules."

[undeadarmies]

"To not know about regular people?" That sounded... Terrible. Chloe tilted her head again, brushing a stray strand of hair behind her ear as she watched Martin for a moment.

She didn't think it sounded arrogant, just miserable. "Why not? Shouldn't you get to know the people you're trying to keep safe, though?" That made sense to her. It was something that she'd want, to feel more of a connection. But she knew that things that made sense to her weren't always how other people felt.

[theguideless]

He fidgeted, his shoulders shrugging up a couple times for lack of a better reply. Truly, he didn't wonder about it much — not the way some of his cousins did. Snooping around caused trouble, anyhow, and he preferred not to cause much more.

"It's..." He fished for the right answer, grimacing a little as the sound dragged on. At the end of it, his mouth tugged with half a weak, split-second grin. "I don't know. It's just not...something we do. We stay out of the way until we have to be there."

[undeadarmies]

She smiled back, if only to help make him seem more comfortable. "Must get lonely, though. Having to stay out of the way. I'd have been curious to get to know people." Her nose wrinkled then. "That's just me, though! So you... definitely don't have to listen to me. It's your life."

She didn't have any right to butt into his life, not when she didn't even really know anything about it. With a sigh, she pulled her feet out of the river. "We should probably get going back before they send someone after us. Poor little kids, going off on their own without an adult to hold their hands."

[theguideless]

She sounded kind of like Danielle, Martin thought. His cousin, who bragged about bravely sneaking off to mingle with humans. That wasn't something Martin would've dreamed of doing himself, yet here he was...doing pretty much that, though not by choice. It was weird.

He gave a nasally sound at her remark. Little kids. They were deemed as such, the two of them, weren't they? It was rather bothersome, if only because he saw no reason for anyone to truly bother wasting a worry. Instead they should—

His face turned a shade whiter and twisted into a big-eyed stare of surprise. Those eyes locked on her foot — more accurately, on what was residing on her foot.

"Chloe..."

[undeadarmies]

"Wh-what is it?" The look made her nervous, and for a moment, Chloe thought about ignoring it. Thought about pretending that whatever was causing him to look that way was definitely not something she wanted to know about. But she wasn't some baby anymore, and she'd definitely faced some disturbing things...

Swallowing loudly, she looked down at her foot. It was long and black, attached to her foot like a parasite that she hadn't even felt. Even if she had never seen one in person before, she could recognize it from movies. Leech. It was about half a second after she connected the name to the creature attached to her that she jumped up and screamed.

Not that that was likely going to help her in either removing the thing or making her seem capable of handling herself.

"Get it off of me!" Her heart hammered in her chest as the panic rose.

[theguideless]

When Chloe jumped, Martin jumped. And then slipped back on his rear and scrambled back up again, fast as he could as she cried out. He hadn't seen a leech for himself before; that bit of knowledge would've been handy, especially to keep his own panic down. For all he knew, it was one of those little monsters back home that slunk out of water and into cattle's noses, made them crazy.

Actually, all he thought then was get it off, same as the plea.

He leaned forward and down, almost landing on his knees, and grabbed her ankle with little care for balance or forewarning as he dragged his hand down her foot to try and scrape it off. He made an undignified, unpleasant sound as he felt his palm bounce over it — it's SQUISHY — and forced himself to close fingers on it and pull. Yank, rather, because there was no grace or care in his actions.

All this was done while still in forward motion. He had no balance, swinging his leech-handling arm out while his other was clinging to her leg, and just kept going.

It was probably not the most elegant tumble either had ever took.

"Gauh–!!"

[undeadarmies]

Martin grabbed her ankle, and she began to pitch forward from the force of the action, but that was the least of her concerns at the moment. The creature being yanked off of her hurt and tugged a whimper from her. Then she was falling, panic still bubbling up in her.

It's just a leech, you've definitely faced worse than that.

That didn't make this situation any better!

Chloe hit the ground face first, luckily being able to keep from smashing into the dirt at the last minute when she put her hands out to break the fall. Her palms hurt from the scrape, but that wasn't much of a worry. She'd had worse injuries than this. She breathed heavily, trying to calm herself. Panicking meant she'd release her powers, and there were way too many corpses around the jungle for her to not have control.

She sat up shakily. "I-i-is it gone?" A deep breath. "Are you okay?"

[theguideless]

"Nguh—!"

His head had bumped her knee on their collective-but-separate ways down.

...Rather, he would hope that had been her knee, but he had no real way to know for sure. He'd had less of a distance to fall, and had far less trouble about tucking his elbows in and saving his face from an intimate introduction to the dirt and river mud, though his feet had slid under him and dangled with the tips of his shoes grazing the water.

With much of himself still resting on his forearms, he lifted his head and winced after-the-fact, seeing Chloe too had taken a spill on account of him. He tried, too, to not think too hard on having hit her knee or...whatever it was. His face was redder again.

As for it? He quickly dropped his gaze to seek out her foot, very grateful to have something to look for instead of simply looking like a fool.

"Uh, it'sss...not there," he reported, having spotted the little pucker of red where the leech had latched on.

Because I grabbed it.

Realization settled on his face. And it's still in my hand.

Grimacing, he rolled onto his side and opened up the hand in question, exposing a black-and-red, gooey mess of an ex-parasite. Ew.

"It's dead. I think." And that was a relief. No postmortem squirming or gurgling was going on, either, which was an even better sign. He seemed much more relieved than grossed out by that pont.

[undeadarmies]

Chloe laughed. The situation as a whole was not exactly funny in the humorous sense, but just the last minute or so was completely out there. The leech, being knocked over. It felt weirdly normal to her.

She should really be questioning her sanity at this point.

Not there. Good, that was a good sign. Couldn't you get diseases from leeches, though? She leaned over, checking out her foot. There was some blood, and she remembered hearing somewhere that the parasites used an anticoagulant, but it could be worse. Making a face, she sighed and looked back over at Martin.

And then she noticed the dead thing in his hand, squished. "That's seriously gross." Glancing around, she grabbed a leaf and almost went to wipe his hand off for him before pausing. "I, um... Here. Use this to, you know. Clean your hand."

[theguideless]

The laughter took him by surprise, and it showed in the way he gaped at her. And yet...his mouth tugged a little. And his breath, rather than the shaky exhale, rattled with something weak and very foreign. He gave a weak, little laugh in exchange, something which he didn't seem to have a way to cap off.

He gave a nervous giggle, which, though muted just by the nature of being so rare, still lingered even as Chloe went about for the leaf. Martin drew his sleeve to his mouth to stifle it before realizing that was the one with the leech-filled hand and switched.

"Mhrhm," he said, muffled and unintelligible. He groped for the leaf, eyes crinkling as he felt the squishy dead thing against it, pulling it away. "Thank you..."