voidtreckerexpress | A New Platform [Intro Post April!]

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A New Platform [Intro Post April!]

On the Train

Two days after they return from their mission they are awoken as usual "Good morning passengers, it is day sixteen of the month of Egret. The shop has been updated and points have been applied to passengers tickets."

Those that go to check the shop terminals will find they have indeed updated, with the option to buy larger items and also animals. The morning goes on until just after noon there is a second announcement.

"Shortly arriving into a designated void platform. Exit from void in ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one." A lurch and a jolt and they are soon surrounded by the fog that means they are at a platform. Though the fog is thick, thicker than usual perhaps, there are patches on sunlight shining through and it is pleasantly warm.

The doors open and the first few to disembark do so with rucksacks on, hoods pulled up, silent and almost blank faced. Cu Chulain, Dio Brando, Disreputable Dog, Heiji Hattori, Loki Maedhros, Maglor, Naruto, Thor, Tobias Fangor.

They walk to the barriers, show their tickets and disappear.

But on the platform itself there are once again new faces. All are stood, waiting for the train.

For New Passengers

At first all they can see is steam. Billowing around them as they come to their senses. They are standing, in clothes that are not their own, styles they might not even recognise. They are carrying a rucksack on their back. For a moment it seems to just be them, alone in the white haze but then as people begin to shift or call out it will become apparent they are not alone.

The platform is not large and it holds eighteen figures all facing the tracks, all dressed in cargo trousers and hoodies. It's warm but foggy making it hard to see much, but there are clearer patches bathed in sunlight found across the platform. Both left and right the tracks disappear into the mist. Then there is a roaring sound and out of the fog arrives a train. Jet black with gold writing on the side. The Voidtrecker Express. There is a hiss as the doors slide open and out into the cold step a selection of people. Some are human, some are less so. They are wearing the same hoodie in one of the four colours, red, orange, blue and purple.

The Train

The doors hiss open. Those from the train may encourage those on the platform to board. It’s not like there is anywhere else to go and even if there was, you feel a pull. A need to board, a feeling that staying on the platform would not be a good thing. If that is not enough, there are plenty of people on the platform now, to encourage them onto the train.

Each ICP shows the same message and next to the screens there are stacks of leaflets written by those on the train, with further information. The store rooms have been restocked with an abundance of onions, in case the passengers weren't bored of them yet.

Passengers who are not brand new will notice that the train has gotten yet longer again with a sixth sleeper cabin for new arrivals.

New passengers will find their tickets allow them into their cabins. They may need to negotiate for beds, especially if they want a top bunk!

Room is tight but there are storage cubbies at the head of each bed, beds fold up and the bottom bunks double as benches for the small table. There is storage under those benches and you will hopefully find a pillow for your bed if it has not been nabbed by a roommate, there are also spare blankets for if it gets cold.

Departure

A second horn sounds to encourage any stragglers and the doors slide shut. Veteran passengers know what will happen next, they may wish to brief their new companions.

The train sets off, the fog obscuring the view as it picks up speed.

"Welcome aboard, passengers of the Voidtrecker Express.” A female-coded artificial sounding voice echoes throughout the train. "Please take the time to read the passenger information displayed on the Information and Communication points and familiarise yourself with the layout and emergency exits."

The train begins to tilt, leaving the ground and rising up into the fog filled sky.

"Entrance into Voidspace imminent. New passengers are advised to remain seated. Entry into Voidspace in ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one."

A shudder, a jolt, a lurch to the left. A flash of light, colourful and blinding. As quick as it happens it is done. The train seems to steady. The fog from the windows is gone now, replaced with a kaleidoscope of ever changing colours.

Welcome to the Void!

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There's something there. A feeling of curiosity, though it is far away. Not reaching out. Indeed almost as if it is holding back. But there, distant but present.

On Xander's end, Nita centered herself, letting her mind tag along (and bidding Cottonball hello, so she wouldn't think she was being ignored once they both went under).

This station wasn't any world, perhaps not even any when- but that thought was a distraction, quickly dispersed.

She was curious as well - and, through her, the peridexis acting as an anchor was, too.

This was about as far as Nita had gotten the last couple of times, which she did her best to communicate quietly to Xander.

Xander's a stubborn git, though. The train may be holding back, but he has always been the sort to reach--and this is, indeed, what he attempts to do, reaching out. Not forcefully--oh, in some ways and with some folk he'd be more than happy to do such a thing--but here, he feels as if restraint and gentleness was prudent. But he's a bit more forward, even as he remains polite.

The feeling is now more like...a child, begging for its parents' attention? Xander could still be rebuffed, but he's definitely willing to be more insistent. But he hasn't reached demanding. Not yet. That doesn't strike him as a good idea, though he offers something of a query to Nita to ask if she concurs with his assessment.

He doesn't get the attention, the presence is still holding back and it feels almost deliberate. It can hear, it just isn't answering.

Nita glances at Xander. Patience is a virtue, but is it enough?

I wonder... is it being held back - restrained - by something after all? she projects to him, using fewer words and more images. Or is it holding itself back?

The 'why' seemed obvious in the latter case - 'for their own safety'.

Well, maybe they had their own opinions on what they could take!

He's still intent, for the moment, to try to push deeper--since the train itself won't answer, he thinks an attempt to talk to the very metal of the train itself might give them something, at least.

As for Nita's question, he just projects uncertainty--if she can't see him shrug. He can't tell. Xander doesn't know. Could be either. Really, could be both, in his mind, as unsettling as that is to him.

He can visualize the molecules of the metal in his mind's eye--Alex's foster-father had taught him that much science--and he sends a query at them, too. Worst they can do, in his mind? Ignore him, just like the greater whole had.

???

The molecules are just that, made of a strange metal but metal none the less. He doesn't get the feeling they are ignoring him, but they definitely don't have much to say, they are just metal molecules. They are listening though.

If you're going to ask anything, now's probably the time, Nita does her best to indicate.

Say, how long the metal's existed, let alone in this shape.

Nita, for her part, is paying attention to the molecular structure, mentally 'saving' it in case they encounter it elsewhere.

Xander is uncertain how to put that, but he can basically compress Nita's question, so he does that as best he can--he concentrates very hard to get that snapshot across, though he hopes that the molecules might have 'heard' her intent.

He's doing his best to do the same, though his is less 'mental saving' and more learning the feel of it, so he'll be more likely to sense such a structure around the train--assuming they're not surrounded by it already...

He gets no answer, no sense of age or time or any sense that the metal is responding to him at all. But they both can feel the molecular structure, get the feel of it and how it fits together.

That could mean anything from 'actually timeless' to 'how dare you ask', though the silence is too nonjudgmental to really tell.

It's certainly stable, I'll give it that much, Nita broadcasts quietly, in a tone of begrudging respect.

But the peridexis has something more to add - to Xander, its as if the voice of his own thoughts is speaking, though the thought is not his own: /Perhaps it is, in a word, self-built?/

Nita's mood shifts toward surprise, but the peridexis does not clarify further, at least not yet.

He can't broadcast words, but there's definitely a sense of annoyance or irritation. Xander's tempted to sit there in a fit of pique and wait for it to give him something, with all the patience (or perhaps stubbornness!) that Earth can muster. However, he knows the failings of his mortal body will have him serving some biological need, sooner or later...

!!! Xander's definitely surprised--both that something not the train is talking to him, and the suggestion it makes. While he does start to work his way up from trance, there's a definite intent he has to not let up until they get something. Even if it's not immediate.

The same almost their-thoughts from the train. Distant and not responding, except for that tiny part of acknowledgement that whatever Xander and Nita are feeling, knows that they are there.

But it might be a long wait, if he is being stubborn about it.

Maybe you should introduce yourself, Nita prods the Spirit of Wizardry. It in turn seems abashed.

/Apologies. I'm peridexis, the soul of a wizard's spell as it were. I retained my presence upon Nita's arrival here. I can help sustain the connection, if you prefer? Though I expect it will be some time yet before anything happens,/ it continues, sounding both wry and oddly respectful of the train by the end there.

"Maybe we ought to just try again later?" As Xander's very well aware that at some point, he'll need to eat or something else. He doesn't expect anyone to look after him for magic's sake, though he's still stubbornly curious. Just not willing to be dumb about it. That phase has, at least, mostly passed.

"I wonder what it'll take, though," he admitted. "You'd think if it's sentient or has a presence, wouldn't it be a little curious?"

Or maybe he's just projecting, because really, Xander is curious. Intensely so. But he reminds himself again that patience is a virtue, and one he's tried to cultivate, since he's seen the results of impatience.

If anything, when the peridexis starts to talk the presence moves further away. The mental equivalent of curling up, making itself smaller, not quite hiding, but definitely making itself less obvious.

It's much further away now, in both their senses.

Again, a wince. This was definitely not like dealing with Nautilus; where he had been teasing, even playful, this presence was shy. Perhaps even worried?

The peridexis likewise hides itself, though it only leaves Nita confused.

Maybe it doesn't like being questioned, Nita ponders.

But later seems a good idea regardless.

It wasn't like dealing with...say...Zohak, either. That presence had been young and confused before he'd incarnated himself; the train had a presence, but where Zohak had been little more than a baby, the train was more...inscrutable, a mystery.

Xander hated mysteries.

"Guess that's what we have to do, then. I mean, it's not like we were trying to hurt it..." Even if the peridexis had frightened the train, it wasn't like any of them had been actively making an attempt at harm. But then again, maybe there was a grain of truth in the opposite...that for whatever reason, the train was afraid of harming them?

It was confusing. "Beyond that, I've got nothing. My brother was the one who was the best at being a think-tank. Me? I'm the rebel." But Xander laughed at that.

Yeah.

Nita sounds disappointed - and thus, tries to surface from the connection to answer Xander properly.

"If we come back at this later, that also means time for brainstorming," she points out.

"Oh, definitely. Maybe we'll get an in somehow." But Xander couldn't help but laugh at his optimism, too. Fat chance of that, is what he actually thinks.

"Still, I guess we just kind of have to keep an eye on it? As much as we can? I can always subtly try to read it, even if it just comes back like it is now, as distant." He shrugged at that.

"Persistence is our best friend, here," Nita observes, stretching from where she's sitting.

The peridexis has its own thoughts on the matter of keeping contact with the train, but it keeps those to itself.

"It's something, anyway. ...Aaaand there's the crash," she moans, putting her head in her hands."

"Energy crash, I mean."

It's bound to be worse for Xander.

"Will eating help?" For him, he knows that the crash will hit and he will want to eat like a proverbial horse. So he's hoping that there's a lot of food here, somewhere...

"Show me to your kitchen...and I'll help you make some. But I'm going to make a pig of myself." Luckily he likes onions. Especially if he can make a couple cheese and onion sandwiches...

He's had worse, so...

"And a nap. What cabin does your ticket say you're in, by the way? And yeah, I can show you to the kitchen."

It will be a very food-filled adventure, this next half-hour or so.

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A New Platform [Intro Post April!]

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Things the peridexis is thinking but not saying: "Well, that's torn it."

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Have the go-ahead to skip the train this round; are we nearing thread wrap, though?

Probably yes, especially considering what's current events :3

Aye. ^^

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