voidtreckerexpress | Echoes in a Void

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Echoes in a Void

"Good morning passengers, today is day twenty of the month of Horseshoe." The day begins normally at least. Passengers wake in their bed, perhaps get up, begin to start their morning.

It is perhaps less than an hour after waking that the first problems occur, turbulence making the train shake and roll. It's not quite bad enough to throw most sure footed passengers off their feet, but it is not very pleasant. Anyone near the window will notice the void looks different. The colours are bolder and shift more violently than usual.

"Passengers of the Voidtrecker Express, please brace yourselves for a Voidstorm." The announcement is not that useful, but a moment later the ICPs all show a message.

The void continues to shift and swirl, violent and mesmerising.

Outside

It might be that the strange effects of the void draw them to the windows, or it might be that they hear a voice. A friend, a lover, a mother. Calling them. Soft and sweet, high and playful.

Join us. It's tempting, faces show in the void outside, pleading and cajoling. Passengers might even see places, a home, a land long lost. Just outside, not out of reach at all. All they have to do is join them, enter the chaos of the void. Or at least stay close, watch through the windows, stare into the void...

Inside

The shapes outside the train are not the worrying thing, as the storm progresses people will start noticing that the train seems fuller than usual. An empty carriage becomes full in a moment, people eating and playing or reading. A friend passengers thought long gone walking down the corridor towards them. Or perhaps it is not a voidtrecker that they know, but a stranger in uniform going about their business, seemingly normal until they pass through them, leaving them chilled and weak.

They gravitate towards those who are alone, following them, gathering around them, sapping them of energy.

Safety in Numbers

Sticking together is the safest course of action. Being together, physical contact or just shared activities will make the echoes leave them alone. Start a game, encourage a beanbag reading circle. Anything to keep people distracted and together.

Stay strong, Voidtreckers, the storm shall soon pass.

(OOC: Here is the ooc information for this event. This post can be used as a catch all, or you can start your own posts set during this time.)

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He looked back over. "If it was the only way you might ever see your parents again, or your brother, or your best friends... If this was the closest you'd ever get to being with them again... Wouldn't it be worth a headache, even passing out? It's not going to kill me. I'll take the pain and an unexpected nap to see them again," he said softly but strongly. "It's worth it."

Besides, there was always the slightest chance that Dominic could hijack the vision and ACTUALLY communicate with him, and that communication could save someone's life on the train. Maybe even his own. He had to take the chance.

He offered back what he could of the webbing.

"But it's not reaaaaaaalllll--"

Ken steps forward and tries to put himself between Spark and the window.

"Are you that preoccupied with seeing the past?!" he asks. "Wouldn't the people you see want you to do things you can only do now?"

He sounds angry, but it's laced with pain. Spark had said "brother".

Ken is deliberately not looking out that window.

"They'd want me with them. Want me home. Well some of them," his tone got a little rueful. "Dad usually wanted me as a far away as possible, but then... that's dad." And something he almost never said to anyone but Adrien. He sighed.

"If this is what I think it is, it's not going to last long anyway. And It isn't like I have any photos or home videos here with me. I know not to go out there, I know they aren't actually there. But it is as close as I'm getting to having them with me. That's worth a little sorrow. Whenever this ends I'll have to face my present and my future. For now... just leave me my memories and my past."

"You'd choose that over the rest of the train?"

Ken....doesn't understand. Isn't sure there's anything he can do. Hates that. All of it. To be aware of the situation, and choose it anyway.....To choose a dream, knowing it's a dream....Knowing there might be others out there who lack that awareness.....

"That's just running away."

Wormmon's stopped whining. He hops up onto Ken's shoulder and joins his partner in blocking the window. Maybe what they're doing isn't the right thing to do. Maybe it's this person's choice to make, and they're getting in the way. Ken-chan hates to get in the way. Wormmon knows that.

But Ken-chan hates doing things that he won't be able to live with himself with after even more. That's why Wormmon has to protect him!

"Even if you get better afterwards, if you hurt yourself doing this, Ken-chan will hurt too! So I won't let you!"

"No offense to either of you, but you don't know me. I will survive this. If for no other reason than I know that if they were real they'd kick my tail if I didn't. So I yes, I chose this, for however long it lasts. If it's more than a week, maybe I'll feel differently. But Storms are short. I want to live this one while I can."

It's that deliberate a choice, then. Ken grits his teeth, looks down. Thinks. He is in the way, isn't he? He can't convince someone who doesn't want, on some level, to be helped.

But that's also why this is so hard.

"Ken-chan...."

It's going to take Ken a while to sort through his feelings. He'll be easy to brush aside on the way to the window, if desired.

Gar simply gave up on the webbing and chose a different seat, and resumed looking outside. Sorry, Spark would be taking care of weird stranger. As Gar he was allowed to be selfish, emotionally.

Adrien said so.

Of course Adrien also said he was allowed to have the full range of emotions as Spark, but he never felt right being sad as a cat. People depended on their cats to cheer them up, make them feel better. When he couldn't do that... he became Gar.

That is this person's answer, then. Ken's shoulders slump. Wormmon looks up at him, worried. Gar had made Ken-chan feel bad! Oh, no!

But then Ken moves, without saying a word. He keeps his back to the window on the opposite aisle and leans against the wall, choosing not to take a seat. Instead, he keeps vigil, and ignores the voices he can hear outside.

There are others he could be helping. But if he leaves and something happens because he couldn't talk Gar out of this -

That would haunt him more. So he'll stay.

So that, if Gar's making a mistake, he won't be alone when he realizes that.

Gar would feel guilty about that... later. For now, he was focused on the window outside, watching the people he longed to be with. Some of whom didn't care for him as much as they seemed to from the void ghosts. Some of whom he'd never be able to see again. All of whom he loved and missed.

Yes, even Gabriel.

His hand went to the window, as if he could make contact that way, but he kept watching and listening, like someone rewinding a home video over and over again to hear the voices lost to eternity.

Quilt. Gar and Adrien's mother. Bumper. Even if he could jump from world to world... the three of them... he'd never find again.

Except in moments like this.

Of all the people out there, though, oddly, the two he most wished were in here with him... were Donovan... and Chat Noir. He needed their humour now. He needed a reason to laugh. And he wasn't finding much that was funny.

Except how Donovan was dressed. That hot pink jacket was never going to not be funny.

What's he hearing? What's he seeing? Wormmon can't make any of it out. He's - okay with this, really! - but that means he also can't tell if Ken-chan can, which makes protecting him hard. Ken-chan, are you okay...?

Oh. Ken-chan's teeth are clenched. Ken-chan is not okay.

But Ken-chan wouldn't be Ken-chan if he hadn't stayed, so Wormmon will wait with him! He cuddles up against his partner. He'll wait forever if it's for something Ken-chan wants.

And Ken's not going to move unless something happens. So it's entirely possible they stay like this for a good long while.

If Ken is seeing what Gar is seeing on top of his own... there are a LOT of people out there. And not all of them are completely human, though most seem to be. And if Gar had any clue anyone else was seeing them, he'd probably try and chance Ken away. But it was hard to tell who he was focused on most, as he seemed to be staring at, and listening to them all.

Ken's trying to give Gar at least the privacy of not trying to look, but he can't do much about the occasional snatch of audio or flash of color (is that...a jacket?). The swirling void outside begins to take its toll headache-wise, though, and he closes his eyes.

Which makes Wormmon forget they're supposed to be quiet.

"Ken-chan!"

Yes. That is an excessively pink jacket. And the man wearing it has his arm around the shoulder of a man that looks like he was stitched together like a doll, out of many different colours of skin. The patchwork man was dressed like a pirate, but had a bubble pipe in his mouth for... some reason.

Gar flicked a glance at the voice, but then went back to watching the window outside.

(OOC: warning the link has some MILD potential body horror and wounds.)

So many people...Ken puts a hand to his head. Another effect of the void storm? No, he'd been facing the windows. They'd been warned about looking into the void.

Gar's risking this same headache to be able to see those people again. Ken feels powerless.

"Ken-chan, what's wrong?"

"...I'm all right." In spite of his reservations about Gar's choice, Ken's keeping his voice down.

"Ken-chaaaannn...."

Gar glanced over. "You really don't have to say. You can go if you want. Even if you come back to check on me, if you want."

Edited (Typo repair) 2020-10-20 21:40 (UTC)

"No, please don't mind me," Ken replies, mild but uncomfortable with the thought of leaving. "I'll be fine."

He just has to look at something that isn't the void, right? He should be able to do that.

Somehow. Shouldn't he?

He shrugged and went back to watching and listening. His mechanical ears went flat, then one twitched a bit.

He's really enduring the voidsickness, Ken notes. Wormmon, nervous about Ken-chan's ability to do the same, holds him tight. He wants to climb onto Ken-chan's head. He wants to climb onto Ken-chan's face and cover his eyes!!!

But then Ken-chan wouldn't be able to watch this person, huh? So Wormmon will tough it out.

Probably.

Edited 2020-10-21 10:51 (UTC)

And Gar would stay for the whole of this phase of the Storm, watching.

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Echoes in a Void

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*Gar, not Spark. No one on the train knows that they're the same person.

orz...my bad, sorry

Np, just letting you know.

o7

Re: o7

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Sorry about him.

you're good, ken's got an overdeveloped sense of personal responsibility anyway

Awww, we'll need to thread Spark cuddling him later, never explaining why.

I'd like that!

Yay! Also Ken is getting a future hint.

ohohoho

Feel free to message me on Plurk for plotting. I'm ChickletLARP

will add! i'm ghoulfriend :)

Nice ta meetcha, new friend.

same! also should we move to a wrap here? fade to black etc

Sure, thank you for the thread!