exsiliumlogs | (open) mission: hit the beach

Entry tags:

(open) mission: hit the beach

Date & Time: July 18th-24th, Exsilium Time
Location: Sea Shore during the Late Cretaceous Period
Characters: All! Oh those pesky mandatory missions.
Summary: In lieu of the success of the space shuttle's test flight, all of the Transports have been sent back to the Cretaceous period to gather mineral supplies and volcanic rock, while doubling as a sort of 'vacation' and chance to get Transports out of the Initiative's hair. With well stocked supplies, camping gear, and more burlap sacks than anyone could possibly ever use, the Transports have been set under a protective dome and told to collect what they can... and to enjoy the sunshine.
Warnings: Shenanigans!

The overflow log can be found HERE!

It's almost surreal, the quality of color, of light, of oxygen saturation in the air once people arrive. It's so rich that the Initiative sent people back with respirators, to help ease the transition, and warned those who would listen about the effects of too much oxygen on a system.

What they don't warn for is the sheer alien familiarity of the landscape, the warmth, the roughness of the sand on the beaches. This is not the fine, sandy beaches out of vacation dreams, but a rougher, larger granule sort, with shells that might be recognizeable as ancestors to ones those from Earth would remember washing up on familiar beaches, millions of years later.

Most striking is the lack of abundant wildlife found among the fronds and leaves and foliage, or underneath the surface of the saltier, much warmer waters extending off the beach. While acting as a permeable membrane to oxygen and water, along with the sorts of phytoplankton that kept sea creatures alive, all the larger animals had been pushed out by the Initiative's installment of the safety dome. Along the transparent walls, curious creatures would come close, peer in, tap against the barrier and run off if frightened, but very few were found inside at any size larger than that of a house cat. It was for the better in the long run.

Too bad that the Initiative didn't have ultra-violet blocking technology in their shielding. For all the atmosphere is in much better shape millions of years in the past, the sun is as strong as ever, and the unwary will be burned through and through if they're not careful.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Of course~!

I can get help, it's no problem! Go on and change back, it'll be fine, 'kaaay?

< Thank you, Break. >

( She sounds honestly grateful, glad he's not going to push himself, glad she doesn't have to keep pushing herself. Collette envisions herself, feeling the demorphing begin with the haphazard way it always does.

Where there'd been a dolphin, now there was a girl in her two piece bathing suit, gasping as the water surprises her with a wave that rides up her back and prompts her into pushing herself up off the ground and twisting over. )

Woah! Oh that's warm!

[ His hand had been resting on the back of the dolphin; as she demorphs, he can feel skin beneath his fingers. Which is when he wonders...

Is she--?

Any lingering resentment he might have had about being required to call for help is gone in an instant, as he puts two fingers in his mouth and whistles, while waving his other arm above his head. ]

Hey! Hey Gilbert, over here!

[ That idiot has been fretting by the beach all day, watching anxiously for Oz, surely he won't fail to see. And if Collette is indeed in the altogether, he won't fail to weep! ]

[Fretting by the beach: check.

Prepared to weep: double check.

Break is right on all accounts as Gilbert sits in the shade near the shore, chin propped up on his knees as he sits and ponders just what sort of effect this trip has left on their home. Had he left the stove on? It's going to be a while, they should have thrown away the food that would rot before leaving. Dust will surely settle, he'll have to end up dusting first. No, wait, rotting food will smell bad, trash can be handled before anything else. Of course they'll need to clean clothes after a week outside in this sand, that might end up being a day long chore all by itself, especially if Oz keeps spending as much time as he has in the sand and--

His attention snaps back to the water as his name is called. Damn it, what does Break need now? He squints and puts a hand over his eyes, focusing his vision on his superior and the person at his feet.

Wait. His feet? Is that really-?!]

C-Collette?!

[Never mind her state of undress, why is she so near the water?! Instantly Gilbert is stumbling to his feet and running at full speed towards the pair. He'll notice the bathing suit in. A second. Comedic timing, etc.]

( Man, she wouldn't have wanted those fingers in her mouth after the places they'd been! Talk about salty substances! The water in the Cretaceous was an experience unto itself.

Collette crab walks herself back toward shore on another incoming wave. )

How'd you know he'd be around?

( She asks as Gilbert runs over. She looks back over her shoulder to call out: )

We're fine, Bertie! We just wiped out!

( Not thinking about where all that sand is going oh ugh why are there no public showers a few hundred million years before humanity was a thing? )

He's always--

[ Urgh, Gilbert was probably keeping an eye on him, too. Idiot. ]

He's always hanging about. Lingering, like a bad smell.

[ Then as Gilbert's frantic footfalls approach, he calls out quickly: ]

Come on Gilbert, don't dawdle. It's rude to keep a lady waiting. She wants a lift, pick her up, chop chop~!

Edited 2013-07-26 02:37 (UTC)

That's not the point here--!

[There is a point here, of course, but as soon as he's close enough to see them properly, he very conveniently forgets it. Because Break is a jerk and Collette is definitely not wearing enough clothing! Why oh why didn't he bring his jacket with him to the beach? Stifling heat be damned!

He hesitates a few steps away from the both of them, unsure of how to...proceed...]

Y...you...you're....?!

[Wait for it.]

WHERE DID YOUR CLOTHES GO?!

[He'll ask about the wheelchair in a second.]

Gilbert! Keep it down, why don't you?

( Now she's blushing, even as she laughs: it's a nervous, near hiccuping sound. )

They're back up by the ATV, I couldn't wear them in the water! They won't morph along with me, you know? Break, you didn't hit your head when we came crashing in, did you?

( Determinedly looking at the blind man now because he's at least not making her feel indecent! )

[ Sorry Collette, Break can't answer you now. He's too busy giggling. ]

Heh heh heh heh heh heh heh!

[ Naked girl and freaked out subordinate. Best mission ever. Alas, if only he could see... ]

SHUT UP, BREAK!

[But she's right, he should keep his voice down. If her clothes are at the - whatever she just said - that means that they're close. He doesn't see her wheelchair nearby either so it must be there too. The word 'morph' doesn't register either, so the best he can assume is that Break carried her into the water which is so irresponsible he doesn't even know where to begin!

Okay, time to get her back to her clothes and a place to sit, then. Without thinking about it, he unbuttons his shirt and sweeps it off of himself. It's embarrassing to say the least, but it's only for a second until he gets her somewhere safe, and this way he actually pick her up without feeling like both a pervert and a fool. He's surprisingly well toned for someone who spends more time in the kitchen than anywhere else, and there's a long, angry looking scar that crosses from his collarbone across his chest and down his stomach. The chain holding his blood-seal mirror and Pandora emblem that's usually tucked under his shirt is visible as well. Blink and you'll miss it though, because as quick as he can manage, he wraps her up in said shirt and then picks her up like she weighs nothing at all.

His face is still bright red all the while. He might just pass out once she's safe. There's a good chance.]

WhereisitI'lltakeyouthererightnow-!

( With Break giggling, she's super suspicious, but Gilbert's movements have more of her attention because he's suddenly the threat and salvation all in one. She's about to point out he's still being loud, but it seems like a moot point after he doesn't continue past telling Break to shut up.

The love hate here, all that concern, it was almost fascinating. But not quite as fascinating as the glimpse of Gilbert's chest she gets when his shirt is coming off -- Ooh, Mr. Darcy! -- and there's that scar, and that -- what was it?

When she's swept up like she's a feather instead of the not-quite-at-optimal weight girl she is, Collette moves a hand to be the invasive, curious person she is. It's one of her numerous failings, and the cause of her blush fading in favor of wide eyes and a curious cant to her head.

She tries to run her hand over part of Gilbert's scar, toward the strange mirror-thing around his neck. )

Gilbert, what's all this? When did that happen? ( Over the scar. ) Is this that contract thing -- oh! Oh, the ATV! That's up the beach, toward the treeline.

( She nods her head to the left. )

That way.

Edited (fail is ishmael) 2013-07-26 04:35 (UTC)

[ He'd been laughing too hard to hear the sound of Gilbert disrobing over the roar of the ocean, but Collette's questions make it clear-- ]

Oh my goodness!

[ He's up, on his feet, and skipping next to them, flapping his arms up and down as if he were some sort of gangly stork trying to take off. ]

Gilbert, whyyyyyy! How gallant! Sweeping off your shirt to save a lady's modesty--

[ Now he leaves off flapping and lays one hand, fingers splayed, on the small of Gilbert's naked back. ]

--or was it more for your own sake, hmm?

[ Never walk around with your arms full in front of Xerxes Break. ]

Hnnhg--?!

[WHY IS ANY OF THIS HAPPENING.

WHY CAN'T THEIR LIVES JUST BE NORMAL.

WHY DOES BREAK HAVE TO - EXIST.

He flinches terribly as she touches his scar, and though he doesn't seem like he's going to drop her, he still hunches his shoulders forward as though he's trying to hide his nakedness from her. Break is already aware of it all, even though he's currently without his sight. He'd had ten years to catalog everything about Gilbert and his ridiculous, awkward body, from his scars and superior height to his painfully embarrassing mannerisms and pathetic expressions. He doesn't need sight to know what's going on.

So the fact that he also touches him just pisses him off even more!]

--EVERYONE BE QUIET AND STOP TOUCHING ME!

[And that's all he's saying as he stomps up towards the ATV. He sounds a little angry, sure, but he's more flustered and mortified than actually pissed off. They can continue this conversation when everyone is clothed and sitting down and just - not in the damned sea.]

( Collette's hand jerks back at the flinch -- for all she's handsy and too inquisitive for anyone's good, pressing people to uncomfortable places isn't something she takes pleasure in. Between that, the hunching that she takes to be a sign of disgust with her, not the self-consciousness it is, and the shouting, she pulls her hands in close and goes stiff. Her tone's more stilted, though she tries laughing it off.

It's an awkward giggle of a laugh, but as she looks determinedly at her legs (if you worked, she told them quietly, this wouldn't be a problem, you know) it's easier to miss how Gilbert's reaction is closer to a teenager's than an adult's.

She's still not used to the discrepancies in adult behavior from what she expects, and what really is.

Thus all she has to say at the ATV is a quiet: )

Thank you.

( Without further direction. Set down on it, she can move for her own pack of supplies, all the while averting her eyes from Gilbert. She pauses (if set down) to carefully peels his shirt off and hand it back over. )

[ If Break had been attending to any of this, he might have suspected that something was off about Collette's reactions. But after Gilbert's outburst, he can't contain himself anymore. He laughs until he coughs, and then he's on his knees in the sand, holding his sides and still laughing.

It's almost enough to soothe his damaged pride. Almost.

By the time he calms down, Gilbert and Collette have moved off. He doesn't go looking for them; there's no need. Gilbert, if nothing else, is capable. Yes, that's right - capable. As he, himself, becomes increasingly useless...

He stands. Perhaps he'll try his luck in the water once more. This time he'll be more attentive to how far he's drifting out, and the direction of shore. He walks back into the sea. ]

[He's still breathing hard, face turning from anger to embarrassment and then eventually to shame. He shouldn't have yelled. He should have thought all of this through a little better, and above all he shouldn't have let Break get to him after all this. His chest and stomach suddenly ache with anxiety as he sets her down and finds his shirt being offered back to him, Break's laughter finally dying down in the distance.

Shit. He really screwed this up.

At first, he doesn't take the shirt back. He looks down at his body, touches the top of his scar (of which there are more on his chest and stomach, this is just the most obvious one, where his body looks like it was once sliced in half) where she'd touched a second ago. He's still tensed up, but he stands in front of her all the same.]

I'm sorry. I shouldn't have let Break get to me. It's not your fault, I'm...

[He sighs and then puts the shirt back on, slowly as his hands are trembling slightly. Once he's got it back on, he'll help her with hers, if she hasn't already found them.]

It happened ten years ago, it's fine now.

( She doesn't pull on clothing; just the towel she wraps around her shoulders and starts rubbing at her arms with, one at a time. There's a lot of awkward sand she'll have to find a way to deal with later, and the thought makes her grimace, but it's a small expression that passes as quickly as it comes on. )

It's kind of a hobby of his.

( She jokes, if she's still too quiet. She'd continued to avoid looking at him, focused on the terrycloth towel, her hand, anything else. The way sand clung to her legs in an almost disconnected fashion. Insidious, that sand is. )

What happened?

( Because she always asks. Even now, when she doesn't know exactly how to say sorry for something she hadn't intended to do, she inevitably asks.

Good going, Collette. )

[The truth is absolutely not what needs to be told here.

The truth, out of context without a world of information behind it, sounds terrible. How he'd been taken over by a Baskerville Chain, sliced through Oz's shoulder to spill his blood and open the pathway to the Abyss, only to finally come back into himself and realize what he'd done too late.

A thousand quick decisions came right after that, all of them meant to protect Oz from the messengers of the Abyss who were trying to drag him into it. A thousand decisions that couldn't save Oz from his inevitable fate, but left Gilbert nearly dead at his feet. He hadn't meant to step in front of Oz's sword the way that he had; he'd only meant to stop him from cutting down the man responsible for the terrible event, a person whose face Gilbert had only seen briefly, but long enough to know that Oz would regret killing if he had the chance. He'd only meant to stop him, he hadn't meant to force Oz to cut him from chest to hipbone and bleed out at his feet.

There's no context he could add to that would make anything about the truth any better, so he only says, as he buttons up his (slightly damp, slightly sandy) shirt:]

I was cut with a sword.

Woah.

( That gets her to look up, then away again, but not before it'd been clear what she was looking at Gilbert for -- wanting to see the extent of that. Now it's a scar with a story, something survived and placed down in history permanently, like any trauma wound, or the scars that have marked the turning of other friends to permanent life changes.

It's impromptu and blurted out, what she says next: )

I can't scar anymore.

( Not as a comparison: it's a statement on something that doesn't sit right with her. Some things were meant to be physical, not just carried on the heart or in the mind. She had no choice.

But maybe it was easier when people couldn't ask questions, and that's why she speaks. )

You're still very handsome. ( Yes! There! Compliments!!! It strikes her as exactly the wrong thing to say, but by jove, she'll just roll with it because she has no idea what else to babble on about. ) Girls totally dig scars. Especially big ones!

--Huh?

[That doesn't make much sense. Why wouldn't a person be able to scar? Some heal faster than others, but most of the time a scar is still left behind. Or maybe she means in some other way, a less literal way, like she's become too strong-willed to let anything scar her after all the war she's seen in this world or her own. Or maybe he's just thinking too far into her statement.

Either way he doesn't have a chance to think too deeply on it, because that 'compliment' makes him cringe and grasp his shirt with both hands so tightly that the fabric instantly wrinkles between his fingers.]

I-it's not meant to be impressive! Or attractive!

( Collette pulls at her towel, quirking up an eyebrow before glancing down again. It does make her laugh a little, light and breathy. Yeah. Things like that really weren't supposed to be, but... )

I didn't say that. But the way people see it when it's hidden is like a -- I dunno, a mark of you survivng. Or enduring, or something like that. It's part of you, and who you are. If they like you anyway, why wouldn't that just be another part of it?

( Not something to shy away from or decry as gross just because it's not a perfect example of untouched, unaltered, healthy human flesh.

Nothing personal tied up in that at all. )

[He doesn't realize the connection that she's making at first. He'd survived the strike, the gash in his skin, but what had come after had cut him so much deeper. His failure to protect Oz from being taken from him, his inability to explain to everyone what had happened, brushed off because after all who would believe his word over that of his lord? Break had told him as much: That's because you were nothing but a mere servant.

He rests his hand on top of his collarbone, fingers going slack as he starts to relax a little. At least those words are easier to digest than compliments on physical appearance, because these are ones that he can disagree with easier.]

There's nothing respectable about this scar.

[He turns his gaze back towards the ground in front of her.]

Are you sure you're okay? You weren't hurt in the water? I can find a doctor -

Bodies don't do respect on their own, you know. That's all in your head.

( Gee, they've both established exactly how fascinating anything but the other person is right now. It's too much of the awkwardness for her to embrace for long, and so it is that Collette looks back at his face (carefully, avoiding much more than a passing glance at his clothed torso, even with the damp spots from her bathing suit) and shakes her head. )

No, no, no doctors! I'm not hurt, Gilbert, I just can't walk. Break was teasing you, that's all, and I really hate having sand in all the uncomfortable places, so avoiding crawling was just sort of nice.

Especially since we don't have showers!

( she waves a hand to dismiss it all; dismiss what she can out of a structured, undeniable reality. she's not hurt. hurting, maybe, but that's on the inside, and she'll get to figuring how to handle that again when she's not afraid she might do something wickedly inappropriate like cry. )

[He doesn't understand what she means, not in the same way that she does. He takes it the wrong way, which seems to be a theme in this conversation, and assumes that she means he simply shouldn't be ashamed of the appearance of it, as so many people (especially nobility) are when they end up with a blemish on their body somewhere. It's not the part that bothers him, but it's good enough to pass off as a reason if only to drop that particular part of the conversation.]

No - I wasn't trying to--

[To point out that lack of walking part. Though that does beg the question what she was doing in the water to begin with. Was Break helping her? That could have ended up being dangerous! A wave could have crashed on them! Who knows if Break would have noticed it before it happened?!]

You didn't...want to back into the water, did you?

[It might be an offer. Maybe.]

(open) mission: hit the beach

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