caveofsapphires | smaller patch of fading sky [ open ]

smaller patch of fading sky [ open ]

WHO: EVERYONE. All PCs thus far will be in this log, through active tagging or implication.
WHAT: THRILLS. SPILLS. Hiking trip toward the Diamond City.
WHERE: The Overworld.
WHEN: Forward-dated to May 1st (Tuesday) through May 7th (Monday).
WARNINGS: May contain violence or other mentions of physical harm. This is not summer camp.
NOTES: More information can be found on the OOC post here. Please read it!

Gathered in the morning haze, Sleepers were brought to the mouth of the Cave with plenty of supplies and equipment. Compasses that would point them toward the City. Backpacks full of clothes and food, medical kits, tents and even weapons. Stun rifles and knives — to fight off any unwanted company, they said. ("Watch out for their bite," Ryan had commented. "Those fuckers are downright feral.") The straight and narrow path would get them there in six days if they kept a good clip. They were sent off just like that. Refusals to leave were met with a wall of guard force officers blocking the entrance back into the cave city. No way to go but forward, unless someone was particularly stalwart about remaining.

From the exterminator's station near the mouth, leaving the Cave was as simple as a short hike upward into the fresh air of the Overworld. Dust and an uncomfortable sort of heat pervaded the atmosphere, light winds stirring up the sand and teasing the meager bits of vegetation that had grown. No matter what direction you looked... it was all wasteland, cracked ground and desolate emptiness. Jutting up from scarred ground were boulders and small spires made entirely of glass and patches of stone; instead of reflecting the harsh sunlight, they seemed to absorb it and only add to the muted loneliness of the atmosphere. As far as the eye could see, there was no life to be found.

With no other option, the Sleepers eventually made their way onward.

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And with a nod, Sable went as well, forcing himself to move in a manner that would not give away just how exhausted he truly was. Like hell was he going to show any signs of weakness. He knew that while the mansion wasn’t too far out of the way, it would still be a good walk to get there. He just hoped everyone else wouldn’t slow down enough that it became no longer worth their time.

Though he was usually content to travel in silence, the barren landscape and the fact that it seemed like it was never changing inspired Sable to actually speak up.

“So, what do you think may have survived?” he asked, genuinely curious. Maybe this man really had some specific idea.

He gave a bit of an awkward smile. "Nice to meet you," he said, awkward but cheerful. "I don't have a name that I can remember. But the children called me Twitch." He gave a bit of a wry smile at that. It was a little on the self depreciating side to continue to use such a nickname, but he didn't mind. It wasn't as though he really had a name, and Allen Grant sounded incredibly foreign to him.

"Twitch?" he repeated, voice skirting on something between disbelief and understanding. It was hard not to see why. One wrong move looked like it would send Twitch shaking right out of his skin. Moving on from that thought, Liam continued, "Pleasure, Twitch. Mind if I ask what you mean... you don't have a name that you can remember?"

While usually he'd consider that a rude question (and end up asking it anyway), it was suddenly relevant to much more than Liam's idle curiosity. Was it something like what the Workers had done to him only a few weeks back?

The staring was a bit odd, but, honestly, what about this experience hadn't been? White simply watched him in return, waiting to see what would happen next. At Gabriel's comment, he cocked his head to the side for just a moment before breaking into a surprisingly sincere smile.

"Thank you," he said, pleased. He had been greatly irritated to find that between the sweat, the sun lotion, and the sand, he had actually felt itchy, but as their walk went on it had been relegated to unimportance — both because there had been other distractions and because he was hardly going to try to clean himself off.

"I don't remember anything," Twitch elaborated. "From my dream. Not a thing beyond a certain point. You can remember your whole life, right? I only remember maybe three months." He spoke uncertainly, scared to say much more in case someone overheard them. "Can't remember my name, either."

"Sounds like a plan," Cabanela said cheerfully. He w was no soldier, but they had managed to get this far, hadn't they? He was determined to keep everyone safe. Somewhere, Jowd probably had some sort of sneaking suspicion that Cabanela was up to something and he would be right.

"Have you spotted something?" he asked, after scanning the area without any luck. Not that they needed an excuse to huddle together in a protected group, but if the other man saw something that Cabanela had missed, he was going to make sure he saw it now.

Liam could hardly imagine it. Losing his life right out of the blue—not even having it replaced with something else—all of those years of his life and un-life... simply disappearing? Considering who and what he was back home, if that had happened... well, he might have vanished all together. Poof. Just like that. It wound his tense nerves up even further, a sort of anxiousness he couldn't shake coming from multiple directions.

"That must be rough," he said sympathetically. "Can't even bear to think what that'd be like, personally."

From the moment he started walking, Chivy had wanted his bike. It didn't matter that the terrain wasn't right for it, that there had been a sandstorm and other perils, that his bike was theoretically a hallucination to begin with — walking around when you knew just how much faster and easier a wheeled form of transportation would make things was extremely frustrating.

Even better, whatever his feelings on the dreamworld versus reality, he obviously hadn't been prepared for anything like this kind of hike, which was simply unfair. Walking (and biking) were meant to be enjoyable, not a pain — particularly not in the literal sense. Presented with the choice between more walking, sideways, or more walking, vertically, he had gone with sideways — there had to be some way across, didn't there? And if not... vertical would have to be attempted at some point.

"Why do things always go wrong when you're almost there?"

"Lightning seems like the most obvious answer." Jonas said by way of agreement, speaking some of his musings allowed. "Though I'd hate to think of the temperature of the lightening strike that could fuse that much material in one solid piece like that."

Then he gave a soft sigh. "Oddly beautiful aren't they? If anything in this waste land could be called beautiful."

There are been a few desolate planets that Jonas had visited with SG-1 but this felt different. Perhaps it was because on those planets he knew he had a place to return to while this...this for the foreseeable future was home.

Jonas had his head angled down, thankfully blocking much of the dust, but he too cough a bet as he looked over at her. "Usually, glass is formed through a large blast of high temperature." The implication this caused was not a pleasant thought. "If it was natural lightening, I don't think we want to be caught outside in a storm."

Shaking his head, Jonas kept the rifle up against his shoulder, keeping the weapon aimed as he looked around, just as Teal'C had taught him.

"No. And I hope that doesn't mean there's more then one and we're surrounded."

Her lips pursed at that suggestion, apparently as perturbed by it as he was, and she glanced up at the sky — bare of clouds for now, but that could change in a flash.

"Maybe. Or it could have been nuclear."

She was all too familiar with the devastation left behind by nuclear weaponry. A high-yield blast in a desert area like this would have had a similar effect. Weapons testing, or something more sinister.

After a brief moment, she smiled faintly. "That's only speculation, of course."

"I was trying to remember before I woke up here," Twitch admitted. "A lot of the children didn't like me," he added, a little hesitantly. He wasn't stupid, he saw the connection. Whoever he was, it was someone that the children feared. It made him afraid to know who he was for any certainty, not that it did much good here.

Especially not if the dream hadn't even been real. "I'll... give myself a new identity here. That I can remember from the start." He rubbed at his wrists, smiling a bit. "Just so long as it doesn't involve using a gun."

At first, Jonas just stood in the enteranceway, taking in all the details and cataloging them. It had a very modern feel to it, by Earth standards, definitely not something he'd expect to see on a Goa'ould world, who normally liked to keep their populations stuck in a past era, or even his own Kelowna.

Once he'd established a game plan of sorts, he moved into the room and to the left, searching through the debris of the table and chairs for any items that might have belonged to the owner of the house or just provide any clues. Then, he carefully examined the furniture to the right. If he had to make an educated guess, he would have said there were dining and living areas, but he wasn't positive, only a search of the rest of the house would say for certain.

At first Jonas was skeptical when Gabriel said he had an idea and then proceeded to stare at the ravine before snapping his fingers. But then he couldn't believe his eyes when a bridge actually appeared. In fact, he was staring at it in surprise as it vanished and missed the man's fall until he heard him hit the ground.

But he was already heading over to check on him when Azriphale spoke to him. "He...he snapped his fingers and a bridge appeared across the ravine." He waved in the general direction, which not contained empty air. "It disappeared a moment later and that's when I heard him fall." He almost asked how Gabriel had done that...but then thought better since he still didn't know how he'd projected that shield a few days ago.

The room on the left was indeed some sort of dining room, judging by the decor: a dresser along the side for the nice silverware and tablecloths, and vases hosting completely wilted plants. Two picture frames lay on either side of the room, with one still hanging on by a thread through sheer tenacity.

In the far back of the dining room was a large doorway. Once upon a time it might have housed double swinging doors, but they had long since fallen off their hinges and lay discarded and decaying on the floor. The large rug and tile underneath gave way to what used to be nicely patterned linoleum before it had turned into a scuffed, chipped and filthy mess of a walkway. The kitchen lay inside, marble countertops and stainless steel appliances worn down by the harsh air and dust blown in through the shattered windows. To the right of this entrance was a pantry door that seemed to have wedged itself in its doorway and miraculously stayed upright.

Edited 2012-05-05 04:00 (UTC)

"Mmm," White said, not quite an agreement. "Natural. But not normal." He would take plastic over glass any day. Still, they were interesting. "I wonder how solid they are." He had some screws he'd taken from the repair bay before they were escorted out — they might not be enough to smash it, but between them and the knife there was at least a chance of chipping some off.

It wasn't as if he had anything else to do. Or, anything else to do that wasn't walking.

"Anything you can give me. I knew I should have taken one of these apart back in the cave..." But he hadn't thought he'd need to blow one up. Or that he'd have only precious few minutes to do it.

He didn't want to give his gun up. But he knew there were a handful of people in the group who weren't fond of weaponry. He'd have to see if that twitchy man with the long hair was willing to give his up later; now wasn't the best time to be bartering for extra supplies.

"Now, unless you're still keen on the rockslide idea, it'll probably make an awkward grenade, at least. Cover me on my signal." He pulled off a few more shots, waiting for what seemed like a good moment, when the group seemed in less immediate danger. "Now." Malcolm dropped to the ground just behind the talented shooter, digging out the tweezers and scissors from the first aid kit to pry open the casing and poke about inside.

A headache (or habit) somehow always seems worse after a reprieve. As glad as Chivy was to be feeling anything resembling normal, it would have been nice for things to change at a point that wasn't already at less than optimal fun levels. As the wind started to pick up, he pulled his shirt up over his face (wishing, for one ridiculous moment, that he had a scarf like Sefton's) and started to run. He almost fell when he heard someone shout to his left, trying to turn without dropping in speed.

"What? Are you okay?" he called, trying to be loud enough to be heard both through his clothing and over the rising wind.

"What do you think?!" Liam yelled back, an automatic and frenzied response. This was not good. None of it was good and he was at a loss because he was alive again, yet desperately wished not to be, if only so he could do anything worth a damn.

He pressed his forehead to the glass, one arm raised to cover the side of his face in an attempt at blocking out the rapidly rising dust and sand in the air. He was right on the verge of panic, breaths coming in short coughs and starting to hurt. Liam couldn't breathe, Ken was out there injured and alone—and was it mentioned that he couldn't breathe?

Chivy had never gotten a handle on why people would respond like that — because, honestly, if they were irritated because the first question was a waste of time, their response wasn't exactly helping either. Not much would be helpful short of stopping the dust storm or finding something to block it with.

It would be nice to think that the glass would provide some kind of barrier to the dust storm, but it just seemed to be in the way of getting anywhere. Looking around quickly, Chivy noticed the overhang and pointed its way. "Over there! Come on."

Coughing harder as the seconds ticked by, Liam forced himself first to look at Chivy to see where he was pointing, then to follow the gesture. At least he didn't need to worry about getting anything in his eyes... He bent over halfway, hand covering his mouth as his legs threatened to give out. Yet another reason why being alive was a stupid hindrance right now and why couldn't he figure out how he was doing that teleportation thing now that he needed it? Maybe he would die (again) from his lack of breath and that would be that.

This clearly wasn't going to work very well, and Liam knew it. He used his free hand to wave widely toward the slanted tower of glass and hoped the other man got the point. He'd follow if he could, but waiting for him would simply be a bust.

Chivy shook his head, not bothering with trying to argue it, and went over to try putting an arm around Liam to help propel / support him. The situation wasn't under debate — Chivy wasn't getting to safety by himself. He would apologize once breathing wasn't quite so complicated.

Liam grunted in frustration, yet automatically swung an arm around Chivy's shoulders to help the process while keeping his other hand firmly planted near his mouth. No sense in pulling both of them over in a no-time situation such as they currently faced. His legs weren't working too well by that point, but he managed some staggering steps and those were enough to get him started.

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smaller patch of fading sky [ open ]

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so your tag definitely made me lol ♥

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6th

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