TEST DRIVE MEME #1

[freezers]

TEST DRIVE #1

The universe is fading into a bitter, cold blackness. Planet by planet, star by star, life is disappearing. For the good ship Koska IV there is no return voyage, there is no home, there is only forward. Behind it is the devastating emptiness of a life devoured, and the threat of an unseen enemy always at its heels. It can be argued perhaps that where the Kostka goes death follows, that it leaves ruin in its wake. If you ask Ripley, though, she'll say that they're only just managing to outrun the inevitable. Waking up aboard the ship feels strangely like waking up in a mausoleum. You emerge from your cryo pod like climbing out from a tomb, born new into a world long gone silent and still. The monolithic vessel now exists as a ghost town, halls dimly lit with emergency power, the only sounds being the mechanical ticking and groaning metal of the Kostka, laboring on like a wounded, burdened beast. Don’t mind the dust, the grime or the occasional blood splatter; cleaning is a nonessential function the droids don’t have energy to waste on. Kostka IV, once a transport designed for leisure cruises to and from new colonies, hobbles along on her last leg, urged on and on by the AI left to command her - R.I.P., affectionately termed ‘Ripley’ by her now absent crew. The sprawling, shadowy halls are only trafficked by Ripley’s minimal team of droids, the least that she can spare in straining her corrupted processes, much of both the ship and her systems in dire disrepair. Preserve organic life: Ripley’s primary, core directive and singular focus, the one goal above all else, which must be met, no matter the cost. And now, your goal too, as on Kostka IV, though crippled, Ripley is God, and the body your consciousness inhabits now is not your own - a semi-organic, synthetic host that morphs to fit the form you left, rather than the skin you were born to. You were saved from what is coming (for her, for you, for everyone), because Ripley needs more hands to keep this last ark of humanity afloat, as the ship struggles to find safe harbor, making stops along the way to pick up resources, to search for life. To find a home, and a future, for us all. ( Kostka is a panfandom, scifi, survival/horror jamjar, with elements of psychological and body horror (in varying, opt-out-able levels) peppered along with your general monster movie fair, driven by character interaction and influence with heavy meta-plot guided by regular mod events. Set on a mobile ship traversing through differing dimensions, characters are transported into semi-organic, synthetic bodies that replicate their canon form, able to be upgraded with powers through bonus AC rewards, and brought onto the crew to assist a debilitated AI in escaping a force destroying the multiverse, while they seek to salvage what remains of life. Events will feature some known canon worlds (like Resident Evil, Silent Hill, Bioshock, etc), along with some uniquely built between mods and player world-building. This game is invite-only, and we have a player cap of 30, with two character slots available for each player. The game has been inspired by: Battlestar Galactica, SOMA, Altered Carbon, Mass Effect, Passengers, Black Mirror, and various others. ) GOOD MORNING, STARSHINE ⬡ AKA; waking up naked with tubes/cables in half ur orifices probably, gross A spark of electricity convulses through your body, and you jolt awake - underwater. Or, at least, that's most peoples' first guess. The color is more vibrant than water should be, and heavier, your body feeling sluggish against the weight and drag of it. Or perhaps you're just slower to respond, distant, limbs and mind still drowsy and reeling. The bright fluid doesn't sting when you blink, if anything, it's soothing, healing, calming. Fortunate, that, because you're going to need it. As the pod-like chamber you're held in starts to drain of the liquid, your senses start to flood back in. Awareness filters in like a window curtain holding back the morning sun, gradually easing away with each inch the water line lowers. There's something on your face - a mask, strapped around the back of your head, and other thinner tendrils against your cheeks, your ears, your neck. Narrow tubes are channeled through in your nostrils, and cables have slithered in through your ears, plugging into God knows what on the inside of your skull. There's a click that you feel more than hear, and the tension on them slacks, disconnected from somewhere inside you. Pull - up, back, to the side, whichever way you want - and they start to drag free. Far from the most pleasant feeling (likely leaves you wanting to crawl right out of your skin), but it doesn't quite hurt or burn, yet. That's for the inch wide tube shoved down your throat and held in place by the mask. It's also what's keeping you breathing underneath this blue space-goo though, so maybe don't go yanking it off until the lid of your pod opens. As the fluid drains, a voice crackles in over the sound of water oscillating around your ears. Not something played from a speaker anywhere, nothing projected on a screen, and whether the cables are still in your ears or not, you hear her all the same, as if she's more inside your head than she is broadcasting over a speaker inside the pod or coming muffled from outside. Even still, it's stuttered and interrupted, like the connection is weak, interference like static white noise buzzing through and covering up parts of sentences. ❝ I don’t have a lot of tim— RIP can’t spare the power to run this more t—, so pay attention. No one knows where it came fr— out of radio contact when it happened, whatever it w— Everything in its path. There is no fighting it. Only surviv— Droids handle most of the maintenance, but she’s getting wor— Take the load off. Whatever happe— just keep Ripley running. If the ship stops, we’re all dea— —’re bodies are new, still adjusting. You’ll be on unsteady legs for a while, so take it slo— might end up face-planting, and there’s only so many replacemen— Mess hall’s lock— so make do. The cryo pod fluid’s the most nutritious thing around, just don’t think about wh— —’s all I can tell you. Good luck. ❞ » » » READ MORE HERE « « « At the end of the long lines of cryo pods, the halls meet at a small medbay. It seems some merciful someone has left a stack of thin, cloth sheets on one of the medbay tables, so it's best you pick one up, towel off a bit, and then toga it, until you find something more durable. Hopefully, at some point, someone will discover a door leading to a storage room is unlocked. There, you'll find some very stylish, bright orange jumpsuits. With luck, you'll make it there before you freeze. NETWORK ⬡ AKA; welcome to Kostka IV, Have Some K-Pop While Projection is not yet available, all HOST bodies share free access to a neural network through which they can communicate via text, audio, or video. One of the first things the HOST platform will prompt the new mind housed inside it will be to set up a sequence of finger taps to open up the network HUD. The system is fairly intuitive, and all one need do is reach up a hand to touch the option they wish to select. For text, a keyboard overlay will appear in the HOST's visual perception, and, dy default, all messages will show: a name, a username, and an ID code. Feel free to make these up as you like. These can be adjusted, and a HOST can post anonymously to the network as well (no guarantees Ripley can't trace it back to the origin, but she's not going to tell). There are no real rules on the usage of this network, aside from don't try to hack your friends, or your not-friends (just don't hack anyone, okay, it's rude). Ripley does understand the human need to socialize, especially in trying and stressful circumstances, so have at it kids. Ripley, however, will be making one quick announcement that she will not be capable of replying to just yet - waking you jerks up took a lot out of her, so give her some time. The voice that you hear doesn't come through any speaker or intercom around you, nor is it originating from any of the bodies or droids nearby. You hear what sounds like a young girl speaking as if inside your head, and she sounds exhausted: ❝ ATTENTION ALL CREW: This is Ripley. While I realize abduction and consciousness displacement is frowned upon in many human societies, please understand this was an emergency protocol enacted at the last possible moment. You have questions. I will answer as best as I'm able, as much as I'm able, but much of the data you're looking for has suffered massive corruption, held in a type of quarantine. The most important thing you need to know is that you, and all organic life within the multiverse, are being hunted. The mission of this vessel is to protect and preserve what remains of that life. Take time to acclimate to your new platforms. We'll talk more later. Ripley out. ❞ MAINTENANCE ⬡ AKA; get that human skull out of the filtration tank pls, or u stepped on a droid and now it's mad. We're hoping you had time to get over the Bambi legs and get your space legs under you (as well as some space pants onto your body), because Ripley expended a lot of processing power to waking you up. That means it's up to you to make up the difference and get to work cleaning this place up to make it habitable for you and your new crewmates. It's been nothing but RIP and her droids for the last who knows how long, so those things that need to be functioning for the continued survival of organic bodies need to get working. Here's the chores on the docket: ⬡ Water Filtration; Hydration - always a must for you squishy, fleshy things, isn't it? The canal that runs through the Ring atrium is a large part of the reserves, and at one dark innocuous end an uncomfortable grinding noise can be heard. Beneath the surface of the water where there should be wall, there is instead an enormous fan about ten feet in diameter. It's grinding so loud the sound escapes the water barrier, and the cause is pretty clear. There's something wedged between one of the fan blades and the circular housing it's contained in. Someone will need to dive down ten or twelve feet and unstick the human skull stopping the filtration system from running. Beware, though — the second it's free the fan blades will begin spinning, sucking gallons upon gallons of water down into the depths. Hope you can swim! ⬡ O2 Garden; Oxygen - another must. The up-side here is that the facility has been virtually untouched, yielding unchecked growth for the time no one's been tending to it. The bad part is more about the chaos that's left behind. The garden is nearly a jungle at this point, and if crew is to make their way around easily, manage the hydroponics, and set up the vegetable gardens again to provide food outside of the cryo soup, there's some major work to be done. It likely doesn't help that some of the more volatile samples have broken free from containment and mixed in with the rest of the garden. One hostile species will spit acidic venom at things wandering close to its roots while others just chomp down on anything that ventures within reach. Riply advises boots and protective gear when taking on this task, but getting rid of those weeds is up to you. ⬡ Assist the Droids; The won't talk, but they do beep and boop and shove things at your person to hold. If you're unwilling to help with anything else going on, you'll be assigned as a glorified pack-mule. Hold whatever the droids give you, hold it right there, hold it steady, and if you get shocked because you moved too much to the left, well, you really only have yourself to blame. Keep a mind to where your feet are falling as well - stepping on a droid zooming past will not only be likely to get you knocked on your ass, but probably earn you an short, sharp, electric shock from them as well. Good luck, have fun, try not to die because Ripley's exhausted from waking you up, and the droids suck at first aid— not to mention, very stiff bedside manner. VR / SAFETY TRAINING ⬡ AKA; ur gonna die a lot because space sucks. Let's face it, we weren't all born ready to space labor, or even space living. Loath as Ripley is to expend the power reserves on VR, the lot of you need to be trained up and the droids lack that personal touch that inspires excellence. RIP will be taking point on this assignment. It's a One Time Offer (well, we're calling it that now): the crew working away has freed up some CPU for Ripley, and because positive reinforcement is proven to work well on new puppies, she is rewarding you with Brain Stimulating Activities (aka safety training (or not)). This ship, especially dilapidated and running on emergency power as it is, is a dangerous place to be, even without the endless vacuum of space waiting outside to murder the absolute shit out of you. Characters will be given a VR visor, droids tapping a few buttons on a nearby console, and zipping away. Which, regretfully, means you won't be getting a warning or a say in what you're walking into, but walking into it you are, none-the-less. Sort of. Virtual walking. ⬡ Space walk; The Kostka IV has seen her fair share of daring battles and random asteroid clusters, leaving the frame of the beast of a ship pock-marked with damage. There's weakened structure, thermal panels missing, guns that don't want to get un-stuck and retract back into their housing. All kinds of nonsense. It's your job to tend to all that. Instructional videos will crop up on your HUD, walking you through your repairs, but that's assuming you can get to your spot at all, rather drift off into the sparkling black nether of the universe. Keep a good grip on the handrails outside. Now and again, something might give a quick, sharp shove, like hands against your side or your arm, attempting to dislodge you. Hold on tight, don't be tricked, and don't get lost. ⬡ Planet-Side; Suit up, it's time for a (practice) deployment, onto a little planet that doesn't exist in reality. The objective in this mission is resource retrieval, with taking samples of life forms as secondary. Some of the life forms, however, are not feeling that friendly. Depending on how the VR roulette spins you, it could be a dry planet, with deserts bordered by harsh mountain ranges, low on vegetation but populated by carnivorous dinosaur looking, that burrow deep, deep underground for water, and sometimes reach up to grab onto an ankle, pulling prey down into the sands to finish them off. It might be a thickly forested planet, humid and crowded with exotic flora. Ripley will tell you to collect water and samples of plants, perhaps bring a couple of fauna with. The smaller ones look cute and harmless, until they open their maws and you see rows and rows of needle-sharp teeth. Once you've been in there for a while, though, you start to feel a little paranoid, a little like you're being watched. Remain too oblivious, or just happen on bad luck, and your new stalker will be leaping out to make a meal of you. Or, maybe you end up somewhere completely different. Players are free to get creative with the setting as much as they like! Remember, this is VR, so they can (and likely will) die as much as you wish. Ripley will just spin the VR program back up for them to start again. ⬡ Crew Bonding: It's time to learn CPR! These kinds of first aid basics are necessary when having little fleshy people running amok, and Ripley would rather the crew be responsible for resuscitating their peers than having to grab a droid every time someone needs a shock back to life. An explanation will be given, and crew will asked to pair up and practice either on each other or a few spare HOST bodies not yet filled with a mind save. But, when it comes time for a test, one of the new crew will have to play the victim. Ripley's always been one with a vested interest in authenticity, so she takes control of victim's HOST platform - they stop breathing, their heart stops beating. It’s been a while since she’s People’d, okay? Anyway, the pressure is on, and your crewmates are counting on you to keep them alive. If you fail, she'll... probably turn their hearts back on before they're well and truly dead. We hope. » NAVIGATION « General questions about the game can be directed to the FAQ, while TDM questions can be answered on the comment header below! Awakening threads for GOOD MORNING, STARSHINE, MAINTENANCE and NETWORK can be used as game canon so long as all parties agree. Arrivals are on Day 1, while the other two prompts can take place any time during the first 5 IC days of the game timeline. The VR PROMPTS diverge a bit from what we have planned for the opening and cannot be used to game canon, so please feel free to get creative with those! Reserves will open on: March 1st @ 8PM EST Applications will open on: March 5th @ 8PM EST

Comments

steve rogers | marvel cinematic universe

[accountability]

a. GOOD MORNING, STARSHINE

[ The impact jars him. Hit the water's surface too fast. His brain tells him that he's drowning, suffocating, choking —

— sucks in a breath, arms and legs thrashing —

"Breathe. Easy — in and out. Just like that — " a hand on his back, slender fingers so much like his own,

The water pulls away like a tide. The mask and the tubes recede with his clumsy grasp and sluggish movements, a miscellany of wires along with them. Someone's talking over comms (from where? too close, sounds more like in his head), over static, and not making a hell of a lot of sense. Pay attention. He's trying. Not a voice he recognizes. Not a place he recognizes either, but neither does he remember crawling into goop filled pod.

Sam and Natasha. The three of them were boarding the quinjet, getting ready to head out again.

Then — here.

He hits the floor on hands and knees, tumbling over the side of — a tub? Some kind of pod. Eyes are still adjusting. His body is exhausted or drugged somehow or both, and though his lungs are working fine there's that burning down his throat, an itch in each ear. He tries to get on his feet. Ends up sliding back down the side of the pod. Grimaces. The woman said something about new bodies. A chill runs down his spine, stomach lurching. A hand reaching over to press into a thigh muscle. Fleshy, solid.

Someone else, multiple someones are moving. He's not the only one here, or the only one having a problem. ]

Sam, Nat —

b. MAINTENANCE (WATER FILTRATION)

Doesn't look that far down.

[ He's standing on the water's edge, watching the filtration fan struggle against whatever it is wedged between its blades. Swimming's not usually a problem for him. Walking's not usually either, but after the trouble everyone had upon waking up earlier — well, at least he can say it's not the first time his body's gone through some abrupt changes.

Keeps that thought to himself.

He starts stripping out of the standard issue jumpsuit they've all been giving, down to his underthings. ]

Better check something first. [ Clothes off, he sits on the edge of the canal, legs in the water. Waits a second before sliding in, treading up to his neck.

Better check how long he can actually hold his breath now. ]

c. VR TRAINING (DESERT PLANET)

[ The system drops him on a rocky outcropping in the middle of the desert under a cloudless, yellow-orange sky. His skin is covered, wrapped in a dark brown suit that's nearly skin tight, visor goggles over his eyes. He's tempted to take them off, feel the simulation's approximation of the sun. It's been a few too many days under the artificial lighting of the ship.

Resource retrieval is the mission. At a glance, there's not much besides sand, sand, and more sand. In the near distance the ground shimmers, either a trick of the light or something moving, too hard to tell. To the east is another outcropping, larger than the on they're standing on - and what appears to be man-made openings dug into the side. Well, it's a direction.

The simulation hasn't bothered to give them much in the way of supplies. There's a plasma pistol at his side, limited energy rounds, and a multi-tool with a plasma knife. The rocks he's standing on start to shake under their feet. That shimmer in the near distance? It's now a rumble, and a dark shape bursts from the sand about a hundred meters behind where he's standing. A truck sized, fish-like creature rears its maw, scattering a flock of vulture-lizards.

Probably should avoid that. ]

( OOC: Taking him from a few days before the start of Infinity War! VR prompt is a general set up, so feel free to place your dude into the simulation however you want! )

VR

[bordersystem]

[ Deserts are not her specialty. She had a special fondness for places luscious and wet, so overabundant that nature hardly knew what to do with itself besides whisper. Wind howls across the dunes in a voice she does not recognize and it fills her with a pang of something that must be homesickness. She is still thinking on this, when a creature that should not belong pops out into the open air.

It must not spend much time aboveground, or all those delicate fins and flesh would dry out... She would rather not kill it, even knowing it is the furthers thing from actually alive. Knowing it can't really hurt her. She takes out the pistol anyway. She very precisely only shoots once, hoping that might scare the creature away and let them carry on with something else. ]

[accountability]

[ The fish-worm-lizard hybrid shrieks at the small explosion, the sound piercing even from a distance. It's quick to burrow back into the sand and out of sight again. ]

Good shot.

[ His eyes remain fixed on the spot it disappeared for half a minute, waiting for it to reappear. Frowning. The lizard-vultures circling above have the same idea, quicker to determine safety. They drop back down to the sand not long after, back to what's left of their meal. ]

Let's get moving before it changes its mind. [ And watch their feet while they're at it.

He starts picking his way down the rocks, heading toward the outcropping to the east. The rocks are quick to give way to dunes again. ]

[bordersystem]

[ She gives no real response beyond: ]

Hm.

[ Despite her easy handling of the pistol and her sure shot, she is not a military woman. They had tried to instill it in her predecessor--obedience, conformity--but the Reach had failed in that pursuit. She wonders what is expected of her now. What if she had not been in support of this mission? What would they have done with her, if they couldn't drop her here, in media res. She puts the pistol back in its holster at her waist. Follows. She is not given to following. She needed to move free. It can be tolerated, for a time. ]

There will be more, in that hole.

[ Her voice isn't quite loud enough, like she's talking to herself. She seems to realize that, and repeats herself more loudly, ]

Animals will take shelter where it is shady, cool. But they may be asleep, conserving energy to hunt when night falls.

good morning.

[lie]

—hey.

[ And she's there, her hand solid where it presses against the side of his shoulder, kneeling to enter his field of vision. There's something blank that happens to her expression when she's on high alert, shedding the things that don't matter for the things that do. Extra-dimensional kidnapping seems to track on that list.

Natasha fixes him with a firm look. She's in orange, which is new, and it clashes with her still-red hair. It's long, tied back and starting to dry — she's been awake for a little while — and there's a spare suit draped over her shoulder. Two fingers find the side of his throat, intent on measuring his pulse without preamble. ]

It's going to take you a while to adjust, so breathe.

[ He'll recover quicker than she did, she knows. Natasha changes the pattern of her breathing anyway, like through subconscious lockstep, he'll follow through. ]

Muscle memory's first to go. You'll get it back.

[accountability]

[ Christ.

Registers her voice and that hand on his shoulder a half second before his eyes lock onto her face, his own expression a flurry of confusion and concern mixed with relief. Closes his eyes after another second, his hand reaching over to lightly grasp the forearm reaching for his shoulder. Stable, solid. Usually he'd be more considerate about grabbing for her like that.

Give him a second to wonder about the sudden change from blonde to red again. There's other sudden changes to reconcile.

Tilts his head a tick to the side when he feels fingers pressing at his neck— less to pull away than to offer her slightly better access to the line (I'm fine), eyes fluttering open again, breathing falling in step. His pulse is rapid but steady, slowing. ]

... how long you been up? [ A rasp to his voice, brow creasing. His gaze is searching over her again, more thoroughly this time. ]

[lie]

Thirty, thirty-five minutes. Not long.

[ Short, clipped, mostly through a reliance on a well-enforced sense of efficiency. Steve can process multiple forms of information; he can recover and be debriefed, in so much as Natasha knows anything.

Which isn't much. Except that they have no food, a mass of people, and a disembodied A.I who sounds a lot like a little girl. So that's sort of fun.

The measured pattern to her breathing stays, at least long enough until she's satisfied that Steve's alright. (I'm fine doesn't always mean that.) Natasha retracts the touch at his throat but otherwise doesn't pull out of his space, not completely.

Quieter, ]

Okay? [ Shorthand, waiting for the verbal go. There's a lot of things to do and more to figure out. And also clothes, probably. ]

good morning, starshine

[redweb]

[It's her name that gets her attention.

Natasha has found the sheets, has one tied in a rather elegant toga dress, red hair loose around her shoulders. She's trying to help other people, make sure they get dried off as the air is cold, and from what garbled information she'd been given upon startling awake, it seemed like they might be more or less on their own for a while.

So, she's doing what she always does: putting on her game face and helping others. Not thinking about the end of the world, of the multiverse. Just this, just now, just what she can do. But when a man a few tubes over calls for Sam and Nat he becomes her priority.

Without the beard there might have been something that made her pause; the shoulders, the blue eyes, the eyebrows of disappointment. But the facial hair throws her off, but those names are ones she knows, and she never chalks anything up to coincidence.

She kneels down so that her eyes are level with his, blue on blue, and there's no humor to her face, but her lips tilt a little.]

Deep breaths. Let's get you dried off.

[accountability]

[ As much as he'd love to get on his feet and do just that, he's stuck searching her face. Looks the same— identical, almost. Eyes are blue but those could be contacts, hair's red again. But.

It's the shape of her face. Slope of her nose. Little details that don't fit, don't match up to what he knows.

Eyebrows knit together, almost pained, and the name is half choked out from his throat: ]

Natasha?

[ Questioning her. ]

[redweb]

Yeah.

[She didn't believe in coincidence, but it's still something when he says her name, the way that he looks at her. There's something familiar, but she can't quite put her finger on it. She's a little bit disoriented herself, but she's trying not to think about that right now.]

Think I missed your name, though.

[She's looking for something, and she holds out a hand if he needs it. Her paranoia is in high gear she should be dead, the whole universe was ending-- but she tries to keep her focus on the here and now. One piece at a time.

This is something she can work out. And maybe she shouldn't trust him, but any familiarity was a good thing for the moment. Wasn't like CNN hadn't run segments on her. It could be nothing.

But she didn't really believe that.]

good morning

[nonstopnarcissist]

Cap?

[ Of everyone he expected when he shook himself awake here- more and more stable the longer he spends stretching and sipping Stark Stew (soup, stew, whichever he hates thinking about it)- Cap's pretty low on the list. HIm getting caught, that's happened before. It's par the course, he's overdue a hostage situation.

Steve, on the other hand, isn't one for that. He fights his way out of everything, that's what he does. Man with the plan, all that. Tony levers himself up, leaning until he sees Steve equally covered in goop-

Bearded? That's.

New. ]

The hell...?

[accountability]

[ He's glad he's on his feet for this one. There's a towel or sheet around his middle, thanks to someone who found him a couple of minutes earlier. Some of the cobwebs have been shaken, but he can still feel his body go tense at the sight of Tony Stark for the first time in nearly two years.

Wasn't exactly expecting their first meeting since then to be on a spaceship in the middle of nowhere, but here they are. ]

Stark. [ Spoken like an answer, to his own name anyway— doesn't have much of one for the second part yet. His tone and expression lean toward concern, the same he's been extending to everyone else that's crawled out of a pod near him. ] Your guess is as good as mine.

[ He's still working past what the hell himself. Also, getting his legs functional for more than a few embarrassing steps. ]

[nonstopnarcissist]

I don't remember you having a beard. Why do you have a beard?

[ of every detail to fixate on that's an odd one but- it's safer than considering the goop, the tattoo still on his own damn neck, the fact that he's been cooked up in some sort of syth body and he still has the arc reactor cold and aching in the center of his chest, compressing his lungs, his heart. Cyborgesque bodies are supposed to make lives easier, not massively more uncomfortable-

Not thinking about it.

Staring over at Steve and wondering about the beard? Safe. ]

Or is this one of those...multiverse or. Timeline. Things? Because that's apparently a thing.

wakey wakey, and kind of wildcardy idefk fite me jay

[cicatrize]

[ by the time steve hobbles his way to the medbay, jack's wrapped himself in his bedsheet toga and claimed one of the exam tables to sit his half lame ass on, as he sips at a petri dish filled with cryo fluid. that's what the woman in the pod said, right? eat the fluid? is it weird that it kind of tastes good?

where he is, slightly elevated, it gives jack the view to spot steve's head of dirty blonde hair coming, and had it not been for the body it's attached to, jack may have never guessed it was steve at all with that beard going on. well, no, he would have, but it would take a minute to be sure, okay? given the last time jack saw him was before he was unceremoniously swept away, the petri dish drink goes entirely ignored, plopped down somewhere to the side of him and jack nearly falls over when he moves to slip off the exam table. ]

Steve. [ jack calls out over the others shuffling around the medbay, trying to get his attention as he half stumbles, half carries himself on the edges of tables and counter tops towards his friend. ] Steve!

[ once he's within range, jack abandons whatever chair or stand or lamp he's supporting himself with and reaches out for Steve instead, pulling him into a tight hug, regardless of how naked or bedsheeted steve may be. ]

Who told you you're allowed to grow a lumberjack beard like that? I don't recall signing off on it.

[accountability]

[ His head lifts at the sound of his name— for the second, third time so far? The ship is full of familiar face. He hasn't yet decided whether he ought to be glad about that yet.

Doesn't understand what they're dealing with yet.

Multiverse. Timelines. That's what's going through his head when this particular face comes hobbling over to him. It's a combination of that almost-familiar face and the excitement in the guy's demeanor as he makes his way toward Steve that has him freezing up, letting a stranger embrace him for a second while they're both barely clothed. His own arms hang awkwardly at his sides, and he nearly loses his balance to topple them both over. Manages to shift his weight so that his back slams into the wall behind him, knocking his head.

The beard again. That gets a puff of air past his lips, a wry sound that could be a laugh if the circumstances were different. ]

Whoa - hey. Sorry. [ The apology is genuine, if hinting at weariness. It's been a while since his body couldn't keep up with the rest of him. He can adapt, he just doesn't like it.

His hands find the guy's shoulders, lightly urging him back. Body space. ] Think you might have me confused with someone else. [ Another Steve.

A pause. Tension etched into his features. ] What's your name?

[cicatrize]

[ for a moment there, jack had been thrilled, and relieved beyond belief. there was no saying goodbye to steve, a little less than a month ago. he was there when jack went to sleep, and gone by the morning. he and bucky went around badgering staff and shouting at guards, panicking, refusing to believe he was really gone, terrified it might've been something worse than just being sent home.

selfishly, jack had feared it would come out like natasha and some of the others had - even if he were to come back, he might never remember meeting jack, or the months he'd known him, after. all the times he'd called him family, promised they'd find a way to get him to their universe and save him from returning to shiloh. well, this sure as shit isn't shiloh, but it's still better than where they were.

barely half a minute of flooded relief and joy, and the second thing steve says shatters it, confirming those fears. he doesn't know him.

all the animation in jack's features, in the hold of his body, flood out, leaving him more like a statue, and he sinks back and steve eases him away, moving an extra foot or so to put distance between them, and lean his hip against a counter top, arms folding over his chest. he swallows, clears his throat. ]

Jack.

[ detached, reported. there's a sorrow boiling up in him, and jack does everything he can to swallow it back down and bury it. he hardly even needs to ask this - ] I'm guessing the word 'Duplicity' doesn't mean anything to you, does it?

water filtration

[nadezda]

[ Kostka is not the name of an American spaceship. Yet the technology controlling it plays Korean (South, by the consonants) music for its hold tone, is called Responsive Intelligent Personality (English, from either side of the Atlantic), while a sizable majority of its awakened inhabitants are, as far as she can tell, American. And all of them, with few exceptions, so infuriatingly trusting.

Even this man with his battle-hewn limbs would slip into the tank without so much as securing an emergency line out. None except her willingness to stretch an arm out to him out of the kindness of her heart.

So Elizabeth plays along, seating herself by the edge of the water, palms lightly resting on her thighs and the shadow of a smile on her face. She, too, can be American with their wild, unjustified optimism. ]

I'll count for you. Two minutes?

[accountability]

[ A nod, appreciative. He doesn't waste time before slipping beneath the surface, finding a groove in the canal wall to wedge his fingers into, holding himself under.

The chances of whatever's been lodged down in the fan to dislodge itself while he's practicing seem slim enough. And if the worst were to happen— that's one way to test his upper limits.

His relationship with his body hasn't changed much: not with frail bones and bad lungs, not with muscles and impossible strength, and not now that he's somewhere in between. Not quite a disconnect. Maybe reckless, though. Maybe asking for an excuse to push himself.

Selfish.

Anyway, he doesn't make it the full two minutes. He kicks up suddenly, pulling up over the edge and hauling himself out of the water. ]

How was that? [ The voice of someone who knows he got a B- ]

[nadezda]

[ If the worst were to happen, then, well the worst would happen. Calamities aren't opportunities, they are simply calamities, disasters, unfortunate events. It crosses her mind how she would see him shrink into the depths as she jumps away from the edge of the water. How she would watch until the end, and how she would then have to feign distress.

But not yet.

She leans forward to rest her elbows against her knees, the water lapping about her ankles. She sounds like a proud mother. ]

I think you can do better than that. Try again.

water fan stuff

[shuckit]

Not sure this water is that clean. [ thomas murmurs as steve strips down, arms crossed over his chest as he eyes the large canal suspiciously. ] Or... uninhabited.

[ he'd like to say 'you're funeral if some space crocodile eats you', but he's not nearly Minho enough for that. he knows he'd be jumping in after this guy, if something started swimming towards him. or, you know, throw a droid in as a distraction. maybe. by the time thomas is done plotting up what to do should steve suddenly become a space-snack, the man's already dipped himself in, treading around at the surface.

check something? check what? ]

How'll you get it out without losing an arm? Or your face.

[ because, you know, the fan and all. it's big. it's powerful. you might get sucked in. ~physics~ ]

[accountability]

[ The water's definitely a grade below public swimming pool. He didn't see any diving suits in storage though. Both eyebrows raise. ]

If I can't hold my breath long enough to swim down there and get it out, won't matter. [ Which, is what he's going to do now. He's not falling over himself anymore, but he still doesn't know the limits of this body. Fortunately, no space crocodiles turn up. Brain eating amoebas are harder to track, but he ought to be fine so long as he doesn't get water up his nose. ] You wanna give me a count?

[ Let him know how he does. His hands grip the edge. ]

[shuckit]

[ there's a pensive frown on thomas's lips, and to be honest, he's already more involved with trying to puzzle out the best way to do this in his head than he is paying attention to the old dude in the water, but thomas is one of those silent douchebags - you don't really realize they're being a douchebag until they've abandoned you to run off and do something stupid. so, he nods. ]

Yeah. Go for it.

[ to his credit, he does keep count. he's also really, really good at mentally multitasking, so the entire time steve's underwater, thomas's eyes are on the fan below, the side of the canal, and the water in between. at one point, he looks down at the ground, scavenging for a small piece of debris, before stepping up to the edge and tossing it in somewhere a few yards behind where steve is submerged. two counters going in his head - one for steve, the other for the debris. huh.

when he pops back up, thomas reports his time, voice distracted and automatic. ]

Minute fifty-seven. I got an idea. [ now that you've done this whole test thing, forget about that, because thomas has a better idea. kids these days, right? he takes a couple steps back, pushing up his sleeves, and bounces some on the balls of his feet, about to start jogging away. ] Stay here, just... don't do anything yet. I'll be right back.

[ and don't get eaten by space gators. the kiddo takes off at a jog that rapidly picks up into more of a sprint - his own form of a body test, while he goes to get some stuff he needs. multitasking. ]

Water Filtration; I'm sorry I'm terrible

[carrytheshield]

[Really, when Bucky walks around the ring, intending to check on the sound of that rather ominous noise, he doesn't expect to see a (bearded?) Steve Rogers stripping out of his orange jumpsuit. It twists something in his chest, and he stands there like an idiot and just... stares.

Because his Steve is dead. Because the one that he'd liked so immediately back in Duplicity had vanished like smoke, just when he'd thought that maybe-- His fingers twitch at his sides, his mouth feels dry and he feels like he should say something, but he doesn't for a long moment, trying to come up with something, with the words that Natasha was always better at.

Bucky's in the same orange jumpsuit, and while his face is the same as the one Steve knows, he's a little lighter on muscle, his hair cut short, and Ripley seemed to think he didn't really need that metal arm after all as he's now all flesh and skin. There's pain, sadness to his blue eyes, but there's hope that sparkles there too.]

--Steve?

I like terrible

[accountability]

[ He's got the jumpsuit hanging from his middle, legs still on, when he hears his name. Turns immediately in his state of half undress, eyes narrowing with confusion for a split second. ]

Yeah. [ He turns fully to face the new guy, eyebrows knitting together. Though the face threw him for a second, he's done this once already with Jack. Knows about the dimensional hiccups, and might be starting to suspect this ship has a fondness for this particular face. Not sure how he ought to feel about that. ]

We know each other from somewhere?

[ His tone is friendly, if guarded, the expression on the guy's face twisting something in his gut. ]

oh good :>

[carrytheshield]

[At least topless Steve Rogers seems to only be awkward for one of them. So he takes a breath and there's a tilt to his head, and he huffs a little at the question. He wants to hug him, but James isn't entirely an idiot, so he manages to read the signs that now is maybe not the best time.]

Yeah, you could say that. But it's complicated.

[He tries to school his expression into something less obvious, but he's always been heart-on-his-sleeve, and Steve probably knows that face well enough to read the lines. There's a flicker of guilt as he starts to talk, but he tries to hide it. To not say I let you die. He's been doing fine with that so far. Just gotta keep it up.]

Well, in my world, Steve Rogers was my best friend. But I'm guessing that you're from the other world. Duplicity doesn't mean anything to you, does it?

[The beard is wrong, anyway. Not that it's not a good look on him, it's just-- different. James' accent is a little different from Bucky's too; less New York, more New Jersey, because he really is from the darkest timeline.]

And if Bucky is too weird, you can call me James.