( closed to the kidnapped ) The Princess Peach Collective

[initiates]

Date & Time: August 31st - September 18th
Location: United Earth Holding Compound
Characters: Any and all characters kidnapped during the interim.
Summary: So you were walking around, minding your own business... and then you were in the UE. Welcome, friends! Please enjoy your stay. Try the coffee! It's fantastic! Better avoid the bread pudding, though... (Official Kidnappee Handbook is here!)
Warnings: Kidnapping/Normal gambit of medical tests/shots/reflex tests/bloodwork/etc. Please notify the mods if anything gets into explicit or upsetting territory.

Notes: Player created United Earth NPCs welcome to guest star. If you have questions regarding these, please ask the moderators. Remember, this is not a torture chamber. This is a scientific facility with military aptitude, and seeks to contain, not injure, its projects. (You are a project!)

Please start your threads with a date or timeframe in the subject line to indicate who may tag in, depending on their arrival!
Welcome to the United Earth Holding Compound. There may be an official name, but the workers never say: they all have their own names for it, and "home" is never one of them. Still, as you're left to wander the halls connecting your individual containment areas to the cafeteria of spartan design, and many automated food producers (along with an endless supply of green jello and fruit), you may begin to wonder what exactly this place is. Why would the United Earth have a sense of design?

(Because of scientists, someone might whisper, though you'll never figure out who.)

Mystery unanswered, it'll be apparent they do. Even the lounge area you have access to looks out upon an expanse of green -- one that you are allowed into, if the surrounding U of military buildings, with much less architectural flair, will steadily drive you back out if you're seen near them.

Make no mistake: your accommodations are minimal at best, laughably slapped together at the last minute at worst. Your showering and bathroom facilities are uni-sex, so the more modest amongst you may wish to figure out a schedule for guys and gals. Towels, sheets, and plenty of nice hospital gowns will be on offer; characters so interested may attempt to find the laundry facilities.

All the labs are state of the art, and the computers and such used by the United Earth far beyond what the Initiative has ever provided. The biggest downside for the Transports being held is the lack of ready entertainment. A few board games have been left in the common area, and a few decks of cards, but that's all.

Not even an e-book to read.

Have fun, Kidnapped Transports, and try not to play "spot all the security measures and all the air ducts" too too often, will you?

Comments

[velveteened]

( what he wants to do is deny it, come up with something better, make it out to be a misunderstanding. for not the first time today that he feels himself cornered, fumbling to respond; and maybe ordinarily he would've managed it better, but it's been a long day already, with no end in sight. )

I don't know, exactly.

[overclocking]

[And there it is, the answer he was dreading. Set out before him, neatly, just like he wanted. He just feels worse, having it there.

But even so... he couldn't have rested easy without knowing. A contract wouldn't be a contract, without a price. He'd just let himself hope—in vain—that not every world barters human lives like currency, that children aren't led to such desperation that they'll sell their souls to devils.

He wonders what led Oz to that kind of desperation, but that, at least, is not something he has the gall to ask.]

I'm sorry, Oz. [Quiet, guilty.] I shouldn't have even asked.

[velveteened]

( it's been longer than a year since he'd contracted, the incuse six rotations along with six to go. the initiative's given him time, something his recent return home has only reminded him all the more; and isn't that funny, to be glad of tampering with the contract when that's exactly what he fears here. there are a hundred bigger things to worry about than that countdown, but he hasn't forgotten about it either — and really, how can he when all it'd take is a look in the mirror to remember where it's kept?

you shouldn't have, is his private agreement, but he doesn't say it. )

There's nothing for you to apologize for. ( some quiet fierceness to that, before he goes on ) How do contracts work in your world?

[overclocking]

[He probably should have expected some amount of turnabout; he's shown more of his own hand than he'd intended in this impromptu interrogation.

But then, fair is far.

He looks away, leaning against the wall some.]

Contracts... they're something created by demon tamers, to be used when summoning demons- or so I've been told. I'm not completely sure where they came from.

[He's not even personally familiar with the geas they're supposed to include; neither of his contracts has had provisions for one. But he can only assume that such things would be necessary, for demons less cooperative than he is. (All of them, in other words.)]

A human buys a demon's obedience [-almost says loyalty before realizing the folly-] and abilities, and the price they pay is their 'soul'—in other words, their lifetime.

[velveteened]

( he looks down at his hands in his lap, listening and thinking that one over. demons are not the same as chains, but there have been people who conflated them even in his world, and frankly — remembering red baby or trump or humpty dumpty or grim, it's hard to blame them. summoning something non-human from another place and gaining its powers in exchange for a shorter life, doesn't sound too terribly different from an illegal contract; buying its obedience a bit less so, but it's not such a huge stretch, especially considering legal or early-stage illegal contracts.

he shoots chrono a sideways look, taking in the now-familiar pointed ears and red eyes, and wonders if he speaks about someone he knows or experience, if on the opposite end than oz's. )

It's not quite the same thing. And — ( just as he'd clarified for collette, sparing some concerns for others from his world ) not every contractor's lifetime is shortened, either. It depends on the kind of contract; no one else from my world has one like mine.

( break and elliot did, but that's not something he'll ever tell anyone. )

[overclocking]

[A contract without a price? No, that doesn't make sense at all. He wonders what the real consequences of that are, and whether people are aware of them before it's too late. And if it really were true, why would someone like Oz choose to sacrifice his life?

But maybe he's just being a pessimist again. Maybe the story doesn't always have to end the way he expects.

Quiet for a long few moments, considering. There's more he wants to ask, but doesn't feel entitled to knowing; he shouldn't even know as much as he already does. Instead,] Can I ask one last thing? You don't have to answer, if you don't want to.

[Hesitates a beat, but barrels onward without waiting for a response.] Was it a decision you made willingly?

[velveteened]

( he doesn't like other people finding out about his situation, but he'll keep that attention focused on him if it's kept away from the others at least. besides, it's not a secret in his world, at least not any more than the fact that he's still alive at all; everyone within pandora is aware that the vessalius heir, the mouthpiece of the hero's will, has a contract with the bloodstained black rabbit. that it's an illegal one goes dutifully ignored, by and large; never mind pandora's duty of stopping illegal contractors before they become a danger to the populace.

on the other hand, where better to keep one than safely under watch?

the question is, at least, an easy one to answer. he's staying away from specifics on purpose in case they're being listened to, and even the mention of this irregularity of his contract compared to everyone from reveil here now is deliberate: see, it's not so beneficial, there's nothing that interesting to investigate here. )

It was. ( he doesn't even have to affect the smile. ) I don't have any regrets about it.

( if he hadn't contracted, he would never have had the chance to spend all this time with alice, nor escape the abyss at all. meeting everyone again would've been impossible — and people like elliot and leo and echo, the people here, for the first time, too. no matter what, i never wished we'd never met is still still still true. and they all may yet discover something before it's too late, the truth behind his sin and the tragedy and the peculiarities of his contract to alice. there's nothing he wants to take back. )

[overclocking]

[I don't have any regrets. That's something Rosette would say, and with an expression like that, too. He can perfectly picture Oz, smaller than he is now, earnestly talking some manner of hellish beast into a life-devouring contract; for a moment it almost gives him whiplash. The only piece missing from his little vision is the why?

He shakes his head instead, scattering the thought. Honestly! How many children end up in agreements like this, without him even realizing it? He wants to lecture Oz about all the things he's sure someone has told him before—his life isn't so easily expendable, there should always be another answer...

But...

He still doesn't know Oz's reason. That made all the difference for Rosette. It might very well be the case for Oz, too.]

It seems I know quite a few idiots... [Said under his breath, but with a certain amount of fondness, at least. Louder;] I'm glad it was your choice. [Still terrible, to be sure. But better than the alternative.]

And I hope you succeed in whatever it is you're trying to accomplish, through something like that.

[velveteened]

( he's glad it was his choice too, seeing elliot and all those children — more reminders of his hatred for isla yura and to be glad he's dead. lucky him it was alice and not a creature like that which had got him to contract. except, he corrects himself, it isn't luck at all. it's fate, jack had said, and somehow it's proven all too easy to believe, even for a boy who doesn't put much stock by destiny. he and alice were supposed to find one another, somehow.

even a worthless weed, it seems, can have a bond with the sun. )

Thank you, Chrono.

( he misses alice now more than ever though. he wouldn't want her here of course, in the united earth around people like these (and hadn't that been her exact protest against break when they got out of the abyss?), but at least to be not so far away. it's selfish, but for a moment he quietly indulges the feeling, breathes out and flops backwards again to eye the ceiling.

it's as featureless as anything (everything) else here. )

I suppose we won't be able to find that jacket again.

( with the vent BLOCKED OVER. it doesn't especially matter, really, but he vocalizes the thought as it occurs to him. )

[overclocking]

Ah-!

[Jarred from his train of thought- contracts and contractors and lifetimes are not things to be dwelled upon, right now. He has his entire life to worry about them, but there are things that need doing just now.

Like fishing golden cufflinks out of his pockets.]

I'm sorry... I'd intended to fix them whenever we get out.

[velveteened]

( he shakes his head, holding out a cupped hand when he sees what chrono's doing. )

That's not important. Though! Gil might scold me for not taking better care of my things.

( on a slight laugh. it's a nice picture especially at a moment like this, though gil likely wouldn't even give it a second thought with everything else going on. )

[overclocking]

[They clink faintly as they fall into Oz's hand. Chrono knows Oz doesn't really care, but he makes a mental note to make it up to him somehow, regardless. Practicality aside, it was rude.]

Gil? [Chrono thinks he can sympathize; he has to do the same for Rosette on a regular basis, which mostly entails fixing her things after she doesn't take good care of them.] Is he the same person doing the cooking?

[velveteened]

( he closes that outstretched hand and then gives it an affirmative sort of wave in the air. )

That's right! Gilbert Nightray, you might have seen him around.

[overclocking]

Gilbert Nightray... Wait.

[The name sounds familiar, like he's sure he's heard it somewhere before-]

Is he the guy with the mutated sheep?

[velveteened]

( he actually bursts out laughing, not having to force it in the slightest. )

That's right! He and Break went to the Outlands to find those sheep.

[overclocking]

Oh.

[He and Rosette had taken exorcism tools to those sheep. He still has no idea what those two were thinking.

A pause, while he tries to think of something diplomatic to say.]

That's unfortunate.

[welp.]

[velveteened]

Not at all! It'll be great when we have our own wool and milk.

( assuming those two work out a way to shEAR THEM WITHOUT DYING )