transport log » ❝ welcome to Exsilium ❞

[initiates]

Date & Time: Sept 23rd, 2012.
Location: The Initiative Hold & Courtyard.
Characters: Everyone.
Summary: New Transports have all arrived and have been shuffled into the Courtyard after their initial briefings.
Warnings: None.

You've just been hustled and bustled through mazes of information and literal, wide corridors of the Initiative Hold and you've been equipped with your weapon—be it a gun, a sword, or even your existing powers. They've handed you this light netbook and a small pouch of coins (or a debit card, if you're more inclined), and there are several Transports before and after you going through the very same motions. You can hear the Greeter's voice as she walks alongside large groups, telling them all about the history of this place and sharing with you your purpose here in a hurried and urgent tone. "This isn't standard," she's saying, walking perhaps faster than most of the people she's dragging around. "We don't normally have so many Transports at once. Please, let me show you into the courtyard."

You pass what looks like huge gymnasiums, all with dummies and targets strewn and splayed around the room. Training areas. There are even classrooms, and a few small offices. You're rushed past a large library while the Greeter informs you that you can find almost all your information there, if you've got the time to look—and trust her, you'll have time. You don't spend a lot of time in the bank, and it's a bit of a blur of exchanges with more and more of these strangely-accented and oddly polite-seeming members of the Initiative.

Soon enough, you're in a massive courtyard bustling with all the other Transports. It's not exactly what you'd expect, and it looks more like barracks than anything—huge walls of concrete and stone, separating you from all of the hallways you'd just passed through. It's raining heavily, and dark clouds loom in the air. It's a chill cold, and there are shelters—long cloth hangings that extend from the walls of concrete to house you from the rain, but not enough. Most notably, the courtyard is filled with a marketplace. Even in the cold and the rain, there are several citizens seated at their covered booths and tables. They're selling all manner of their own handmade goods and foods, and citizens and Transports alike are traveling from one small covered shop to another in search of all manner of necessities.

The Greeter's voice has become so faint now, but you swear you can make it out in the back of the crowds as she tells you, "Good luck. Be safe!"

Her voice is drowned out by the busy marketplace, though even the transactions taking place are somewhat subdued. Nobody is overly happy, really, though most citizens can be found with smiles on their faces. It doesn't seem like they're that shocked to see you, either; even if you're not bound in tattered rags and wrapped in heavy shawls as they are. You're welcome to walk up to a shop, and find yourself something to eat—hey, maybe you'll even find something akin to a raincoat. Or, you can join the others under the coverings against the walls. Where am I? What war? She was talking so fast, and it didn't all make very much sense… did anyone else catch it all?

Welcome to the courtyard. Welcome to the Initiative Hold—and most importantly, welcome to Exsilium.

Comments

[hostage]

[He tucks his gun away again and nods for her to lead the way, because he has no idea where to go.]

[payback]

Do you want food? Or to go home? Or what?

[hostage]

Wherever you wanna take me. I guess I'm hungry, but I don't care, really...

[payback]

Well you might as well eat something then, come on. [He has the kind of face that makes Rin think he might meander off without meaning to if she doesn't sit on him. This is what leads to her sidling up and kind of pushing on him. Or trying to, at least.] Hurry up, let's go.

[hostage]

[At this point? That's a good possibility. At least he doesn't seem to mind her pushing him like this, because walking's a chore when you're this stoned and he'd probably stop again or otherwise drift away.]

What kinda food is there?

[payback]

[She'll kind of drag him through the crowd if he lets her. She does enough roaming, she knows her way around a place or two by now, and can slide or shoulder through the crowds easy.]

Do you like sandwiches? There's a place that makes sandwiches.

[hostage]

I'll eat a sandwich.

[Honestly, he'd eat anything at the moment. And he does let her drag him along. He's actually grateful for it.]

[payback]

Okay. It's a pretty okay sandwich. It's kind of hard here since this is the last bastion of the free world or something, and it's not like we're that strong, so things are kind of tight sometimes, but it's still an okay sandwich. We'll be there in a minute. [She steers them towards the awnings and squeezes them under, anyway. Making for yet another awning, this one devoted to food, with a meager amount of space to sit.]

Do you like working?

[hostage]

[This looks like a shithole but he's not complaining. He sits in the first available spot, and that's when he finally notices how thoroughly soaked he is. It makes him shiver.]

Um. Not really. Why?

[payback]

[The whole place is a shithole! She wouldn't even blame him for pointing it out. Rin sits on the bench and then huddles into her coat for a minute, eyes shuttering, before she sits up and pays attention again.]

Cuz it's kinda a pain to not have any money between missions. Even though you can volunteer for some of them. I dunno, it's something to do, at least.

[hostage]

What're the missions like?

[payback]

Last time we went to this tropical island and kicked around on the beach for a couple days until we fought a bunch of pirates and stole their ship.

That was kinda awesome actually.

[hostage]

[It sounds awesome.]

I could do that.

[payback]

That's the only one I've been on! But that was okay. It was nice to, you know, get into the sunshine for a little. I wonder why they don't all escape into time? I mean why bother staying here? But okay.

[hostage]

Well, like, maybe it'd cause a time paradox. Maybe it's okay if only a few people go, but if everybody goes, it'll set off like a chain reaction and mess up the environment and then like the ice caps melt or something. And then humans go extinct so everybody here was never born and then... well, the universe is pretty much screwed, 'cause it all collapses. You know?

[payback]

Wait, what do the icecaps melting have to do with humans going extinct? What's the big deal about icecaps?

[hostage]

Greenhouse effect, yo. Global warming. Once you melt those ice caps, the whole world floods and that's the end.

[payback]

... Are you sure about that?

[hostage]

What? Yeah. Everybody knows that.

[payback]

Whatever. I guess it could be some kind of time thing at least. HEY. [That's to a waiter.] Hey, we need a hand! [Back to Jesse.] What do you want?

[hostage]

Whatever your favorite thing is.

[payback]

There's meat and cheese and a tomato on it.

[hostage]

That sounds awesome.

[payback]

Okay, good. They grow everything here, y'know. So sometimes it's kind of sad and weird but that's why. [She flails a hand at the person bringing food around again, and the doughy-faced woman comes around to get her order in a veritable jiffy.] It's pretty okay being from outside around here at least. I mean they don't hate us or anything.

[hostage]

Well, yeah. I mean, they brought us here on purpose, didn't they?