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riverviewlogs2018-06-15 09:35 pm
- !mod post: exploration mingle,
- almost human: dorian,
- critical role: mollymauk tealeaf,
- dragon age: iona lavellan,
- dragon age: relm hawke,
- halo: forward unto dawn: chyler silva,
- imperial radch: breq,
- logan: laura,
- magnificent seven: billy rocks,
- marvel (616): billy kaplan,
- marvel (616): cable,
- marvel (616): loki laufeyson,
- marvel (616): teddy altman,
- marvel (616): tommy shepherd,
- marvel (mcu): gamora,
- marvel (mcu): loki,
- marvel (mcu): mantis,
- marvel (mcu): peter parker,
- marvel (mcu): peter quill,
- marvel (mcu): steve rogers,
- marvel (mcu): tony stark,
- marvel (mcu): wanda maximoff,
- marvel (tv): skye,
- once upon a time: victor frankenstein,
- original: jeff calhoun,
- original: shigeru miyata,
- osomatsu-san: jyushimatsu matsuno,
- rivers of london: peter grant,
- star trek (aos): james kirk,
- star wars: finn,
- star wars: poe dameron,
- the adventure zone: taako taaco,
- the black tapes: alex reagan,
- the black tapes: richard strand,
- the terror (tv): harry goodsir,
- voltron: keith,
- ✖ dc comics (rebirth): damian wayne,
- ✖ marvel (616): thor,
- ✖ original: sage abernathy,
- ✖ osomatsu-san: osomatsu matsuno,
- ✖ shadowhunter chronicles: alec lightwoo,
- ✖ stargate atlantis: carson beckett,
- ✖ stargate atlantis: elizabeth weir,
- ✖ the adventure zone: lucretia,
- ✖ the adventure zone: lup taaco,
- ✖ the adventure zone: magnus burnsides,
- ✖ the covenant: chase collins,
- ✖ the witcher: keira metz
exploration mingle: CAPTIVITY
what: exploration mingle: rescue mission!
when: June 15 - August 15
where: The River Structure
warnings: violence and/or torture; please put any necessary warnings in the subject lines
captivityOne of the major and most highly-valued cultural concepts in Riverview is that of exploration, expansion. Especially now that, with the recent influx of new arrivals, as the portal kicks into high gear for reasons not entirely known, the Inhabited City, already comfortably full, is rapidly becoming overpopulated. With all the refugees from other worlds pouring in from day to day, the city's safe space and resources are being taxed to their breaking point.
Right now, exploration and expansion is key, and each month, the government has decided to focus on a particular objective, in order to unite citizens in expanding, securing, and supplying the city for everyone's benefit.
the story so far
Exploration & Expansion Progress Report ● The Guardians of the Deep ● What Lies Beneath ● Plotting & Questions
After some serious flooding at the banks of the river, the cause was discovered to be the Guardians of the Deep, creatures protecting a circular labyrinthine structure underneath the river. Residents of the city explored and mapped the structure, and dealt with a good portion of the traps and other dangers, until they found a little piece of history in the Central Chamber of the structure, revealing that it was inhabited by the first people to live on the moon.
While this news has been exciting scholars and historians in the city, something a little more pressing has been bothering the average citizen - an ever-increasing number of missing persons. People have simply been disappearing all over the city, and only now are residents starting to realize why...
how it works
● Phases: Each prompt is a different phase of the operation. Characters may partake in whichever part of the operation they choose, whether it is a large and prominent part, or a more of a backseat or support role. Characters may participate in as many phases as they wish.
● Completion: When next month's exploration mingle goes up, the mission featured on this exploration mingle will be considered complete, and game canon, providing the entry has 200+ comments on it.
● Entry Reward: The reward for completion of this month's exploration objective will be...well, the safe return of everyone who was kidnapped. And some sweet hurt/comfort.
● IMPORTANT NOTE: Having observed how the pacing of exploration mingles has been going and how they are tagged, I have noticed that posting one exploration mingle each month has been a little hectic, both plotwise and for me as a mod (writing three mingles a month has been tough!). I have decided to space them out a bit further, and post an exploration mingle once every two months, starting with this one - the next exploration mingle will be posted in August!
People don't simply go missing, they don't disappear into thin air, they have to be somewhere. And while those who are missing people keep frantically searching, those who have been kidnapped are the only ones besides the kidnappers who do know where they are.
Abducted by a group who have taken up residence in the structure under the city after last month's exploration died down, the missing are trapped in the Central Chamber, in fear of the kidnappers. Their abductors are a group of people that is starting to slowly take on cultist tendencies, believing that the remaining spirits of the First People still live in the structure, that it is a temple, and that those First People need offerings of host bodies to inhabit so they can return and bring their wisdom and magic back to the moon. Things are getting a little hairy - there's no agreement among the kidnappers as to how 'intact' the host bodies have to be and whether or not the sacrifice is in the form of alive or dead captives. Even worse, some of the kidnappers are only with the group to enjoy having power over others and using it to hurt them.
Captives are held in the Central Chamber of the structure, with next to no amenities. Blankets, food, water, and other necessities are in short supply, and they are kept huddled together, constantly guarded and either restrained, wearing or in the presence of a power suppressor to keep them subdued. But the captives haven't lost hope - they are working on getting a message out, finding a way to contact the outside world so their loved ones can rescue them...
This prompt is to play out interactions among the captives before they are rescued, and may include violence or other character suffering. It is also to enact plotted plans for the abductees to find connections with the outside world to summon help.
Once would-be rescuers become aware of where the captives are being held, they start making plans to rescue them - whether someone they love has been taken, they're just a good person, or they just want to feel like a big damn hero, there are lots of people willing to take the plunge and jump into the rescue. But the cult group has been in control of the structure for a while now, they definitely have the home team advantage. They know the lay of the land and where the traps are, and have used some of them to their own advantage.
It's not going to be as easy as storming the castle.
There are two parts to this phase of the rescue: a distraction and an infiltration. Distractions are planned to draw as many of the kidnappers away from the hostages being held in the Central Chamber as possible, while those who are stealthily infiltrating will try to find another entrance into the chamber so they can surprise and surround the remaining kidnappers.
This prompt is to play out any plans for distraction and infiltration. If you have plotted something out on the plotting post, feel free to post up a header for specific groups for threading rather than an individual character top-level.
Distractions only last so long, unfortunately, and so eventually the whole thing is going to break down into a big fight. Rescuers versus kidnappers, on the kidnappers' home turf, and surrounded by traps left over from the First People, while pieces of stationary tech throw out auras and waves of power suppression. It's going to be a doozy of a fight, so prepare for an epic throwdown!
And once the dust settles, there's going to be a lot of injuries to tend to, a lot of people traumatized and hurt and frightened. A lot of hungry, suffering people will need to be transported out, given medical care, and brought supplies.
This prompt is to play out the final fight between the kidnapping cult and the rescuers, as well as anything in the aftermath of the fight.
Have an idea for a mission-adjacent plot, or want to make up an unexpected plot twist or problem and solve it with your character? Just write up a starter, and don't forget to give yourself props by submitting it for the Progress Report.
phase iii
Fuck that.
She's good. Eighty percent of the shots she takes are headshots, and ninety percent of those hit home. They work their way deeper and Chyler tunes out the smell of blood and brains the same way she tunes out the fact that she's killing human beings. This is what she trained for. This is what she's supposed to do.
The only interruption in her flow is when one of the disarmed and disabled cultists spits at Finn's feet. Chyler orients on the man and pulls the trigger without hesitation. ]
no one on this team has chill 2k18
By his usual standards, this has been going about as well as it reasonably can. Helps that they don't have any sort of powers or magic to interrupt.
Needless to say, the interruption in Chyler's flow presents an immediate interruption in Finn's as well. There's always a flood of realization when someone sees they're dead-center in the aims of a gun or a blaster. Where the man takes stock, where his expression starts to contort, not quite fear as much as it is more vitriol, before the end. He's seen it in people aiming weapons right back at him. He's seen it in people with no weapons and no chance and all fear instead of anger, more than enough, more than he lets himself think about.
Finn flounders for a beat. Like he's waiting for it to add up, or to turn out to be some sort of trick his eyes are playing on him. Like they were on a track and jolted a foot to the left of it suddenly, and he needs to take stock of getting back on.
He's killed people before. He's very good at it. He doesn't doubt he'll kill more before they've left the complex, let alone before getting home, before ending the war.
It's not the same.
Muscle memory, he thinks, and swallows it. He's already got a hand on Chyler's elbow, pushing, looking to aim the barrel of her rifle away from the body. It's not gonna break an arm, but it's certainly not gentle, either. ]
If they're disarmed, we don't shoot!
who's chill don't know her
I know.
[ Corpse, to Finn, to corpse again. (And why is it that she can't stop picturing Finn on his knees in a room full of sand, trying to keep a nameless body from being buried.) ]
I know that, I. [ Chyler flounders. She does know. But--
She runs the moment back again in her head, Finn getting the cultist down on his knees, binding his wrists while Chyler kept watch, hating the waste of time, resources, safety.
The captive spits.
She shoots.
Run it back again.
This time her eyes settle on the body instead of going back and forth between it and Finn, while her instincts scream that there's work to be done, there's enemies still in these tunnels that could come on them while she's wasting time trying to sort her reaction out in her own head. ] I thought-- I thought he was a threat.
[ It's the only logical reason that comes to her. See the target, eliminate the target.
(Gunfire chatters away farther into the tunnels and Chyler looks up, raising her weapon in the direction of the sound as instinctively as she murdered Finn's captive.)
Uncertainly: ] We shouldn't...
[ Chyler looks up at him, suddenly worried, afraid she's done something she won't be able to fix. Will Finn tell John? Will she? She's going to have to write a report on this, on all of this. And she's not going to lie.
She shouldn't have to lie. She killed an enemy, disarmed or not. She did her job. ]
We shouldn't stay here.
no subject
Comes with training. And a soldier never stops training. And soldiers are what they are. It's not something either of them can separate out from themselves, set aside like the yolk of an egg. (It's not something, maybe, that either of them thinks they exist without.)
She says I thought he was a threat and Finn's grip loosens. ]
I know. [ Finn won't pretend he's gonna mourn this man, or any of the other cultists who won't be getting back up. They've been stealing kids. They've been stealing anyone they can get their hands on. They're not innocent, and they're by no means kind. Given the opportunity, he has no doubt most of them would gladly either add the rescue teams to their collection or kill them outright.
He fumbles for words, just ends up adding: ] He was one.
[ Neutralized. Contained. But he was one at some point. Finn's heart still won't leave his throat. All the worst kind of adrenaline, everything sharp at the edges, threatening to leave his hands unsteady if he's not mindful. He doesn't know. He doesn't want to think about it. He doesn't want it to happen again.
He glances down the tunnel. Wets his lips. ]
If we keep going, are you good? Because we can-- we don't have to. There are plenty of volunteers.
[ Would Finn inevitably wind up running off in search of half of his CR chart? Yes. But he could put it on hold, at least. ]
no subject
[ She says it with more certainty than she should, maybe. Should she be so certain? Should she be more upset?
Suddenly she's back in the middle of a combat exercise, tagging her opponents with stun rounds, chest and headshots, perfect precision and zero regret.
She looks down at the body, an odd feeling in the pit of her stomach. He has a tidy little hole in the middle of his forehead. The back of his skull is busted open like the watermelons she used to eat as a child, the ground glossed with blood and reeking brain matter.
It isn't hard to imagine her enemies in that combat exercise with their heads split open that way. Fellow cadets.
She doesn't have to imagine it. She's seen it. She's seen them, bodies spilling over each other. Her teammates and rivals. Suddenly she's not sure if she is good. She doesn't feel like puking, she hasn't wet herself, she hasn't lost control of her bowels, none of the things she's heard happen on the battlefield. This isn't even her first engagement, far from it at this point.
This is the first time she's killed her own kind.
She's fine.
She's not.
Is she? Should she be?
Chyler shakes her head, trying to clear it. She just needs to not think about it. She needs to keep moving, keep shooting, save the questions for later. ]
I have to.
[ She can't just leave this job half-done. She's not a quitter, not a child who's going to leave someone else to face the danger she wouldn't or couldn't. ] We're here to do a job.
no subject
It's sort of like having someone hit the ground with a major blaster wound. He knows that there are probably things that could be done that would keep them alive most effectively, maybe even guarantee their survival if they somehow made it into an infirmary. Something that would give them better odds, at least.
But he never learned what those things are.
All he knows how to do is maybe tie something off, slap a bandage over it, get up and keep moving. Maybe. If the problem is just his. He technically knows how to leave someone down if they go down and keep moving anyway.
There's probably something a person could say or do right now that would help, in whatever way Chyler might need help, to give this more ease. He doesn't now what those things are, either.
Finn finds himself thinking that John would be better in this situation, and that he'd trust him a lot more with it than he trusts himself. ]
You're more important than a job.
[ Catch him throwing hands at anyone who'd say differently. ]
So frankly, I'd really rather do whatever's better for you right now.
[ And the best plan he has for that is to let her decide what that means. This is a healthy thread. ]
no subject
She thought she knew. ]
I'm fine. I can keep going.
[ The healthiest thread.
So they keep going. They keep fighting, they keep taking prisoners, and Chyler checks herself each time to make sure she's covering their surroundings and letting Finn do his job. He can handle himself. He doesn't need her protection from someone on their knees. He doesn't need her protection, he's a soldier just like she is.
He's more than a soldier. He's more than a job.
He knows that, too. He seems to know it, to understand it. He wouldn't be able to recognize her losing herself in the fight if he didn't know himself outside of it. She only knows the shape of herself when it's outlined in blood.
They keep going. They keep fighting. She loses track of Finn for a little while, gets caught up in an ugly knot of violence that takes time and lives to resolve. And eventually there's no more fighting to do.
Things get quiet, except for the crying of the victims and the soft conversations of the rescuers and the rescued as they're examined by medical professionals and escorted out in groups. That's when she finds him again.
She's not sure what to say, at first. There's really only one question that matters to her. ]
Are you all right?
no subject
Still. All his friends who have gone missing are alive and accounted for. Poe is accounted for in particular, which puts a hard limit on the number of too-quiet days and nights in the apartment. A lot more captives are alive than not, and that's no small mercy. All that's been left in the wake of the chaos is tracking down his teammates and non-kidnapped friends who were rolling with separate rescue teams. Finn doesn't bother trying to hide his relief when he sees Chyler. ]
Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine. How about you? Everything go okay? [ Personal space is dumb, volume 2, the RR-1 tale. ]
no subject
She exhales, nodding. Everything went the way it was supposed to. The casualties she encountered were almost all on the enemy's side.
This is good. This is fine. They did what they were supposed to do.
(This is her first engagement against other sentient beings, other humans, and that part of it hasn't hit her yet.) ]
Yeah. Yeah, it's fine. [ For a second her heart stops, even though she knows Finn would have started with this if anything had happened. ] John...?
no subject
He's good. [ Well. ] As good as he ever is. Not hurt. Doesn't look like they've been sitting on more than one location, either.
[ He gives her another quick looking-over. Just to be safe. Everyone in one piece, that's kind of the dream, right? ]
This whole thing might actually be over with.
no subject
Good.
[ She looks at across the cavern, and her eyes seize on the first corpse she spots.
She looks away, but there's another.
Another.
She swallows.
This wasn't a massacre. There was no wholesale slaughter. She didn't walk in here and blast anyone who stood in her way. They did the right thing.
She's seen bodies before. She's seen way more bodies before.
Chyler shifts her weapon in her arms and feels the sudden weight of it, like someone suddenly decided to hang ten pound weights from each end. ]
Good. Do we kn... [ She clears her throat. ] Do we know what our casualties are?
no subject
[ It's a big organizational undertaking. A whole thing. ]
But I've got a good feeling about it.
[ About the captives and rescuers end, at least. And he believes that. And it's nice to believe that. He watches her face. The minute turns in her expression. Feels his fingers twitch. ]
Let's get some fresh air. They'll be fine without us for a few minutes.
no subject
If you need to. [ There, it's not because of her. It's not her fault, it's not pity on his part. ]
no subject
[ The fresh air game plan is almost entirely designed for Chyler's benefit. Finn's not above admitting it would be nice for him, too. Get out and reboot. Recenter. Especially if it makes it easier to get Chyler to go for it. ]
Come on.
[ He places a hand on her upper arm and starts heading for the nearest exit point. ]
no subject
What does it say about her, that this bothers her less than fireworks?
She has to close her eyes for a moment when they make it far enough for the sun to hit her face.
The air tastes clean, or cleaner than it did down there. It smells like unwashed bodies, yes, but that can't really be helped when so many of the kidnapping victims are spread around the immediate area. It smells like antiseptic and that distinct fuzzy smell of medical gauze. It's better than the smell of death. It's the smell of people being alive.
She opens her eyes, looking at the rescued. Looking at the reason they fought. That's as novel an experience as killing real sentient beings.
She clears her throat, attempting a smile and managing only the teasing edge of one. ]
We saved them.
no subject
Outside is better than inside. Easier to breathe. Less claustrophobic in every sense. He has no delusions that their problems are identical, somehow directly transcribed onto each other, that they even necessarily stem from the same sources in a lot of cases. But at least this really is helpful for both of them somehow.
It's not often he gets to see both ends of an aftermath. Back home least of all. It was a habit of seeing all the destruction or all that was left coming out through it. A slaughtered village. A handful of people awkwardly wedged into corners of a ship older than most of the people on it.
Outside is better. People are better than objectives. They did some good. And he's glad to be here. He can take a second to be glad to be here. ]
We did. [ Good to take victories where you can. ] Sort of the point, right?
no subject
She never thought about it from the other direction. Fight to protect, not to subdue. Fight to save, not to kill.
The world blurs, and she realizes with surprise that she's about to cry. She clears her throat, blinks, but it doesn't help. ]
no subject
It's a powerful thing. He knows that much. Another one of those similarities. Getting brought up to fight, to follow orders, and maybe not genuinely having something you're fighting for at the end of the day. He met Rey and it changed. And Poe, and Rose. A lot of people, now.
As long as he's here, they're his. It means something. It's worth doing. It doesn't get the option not to be.
(Rose, he thinks, kind in some of the simplest and strangest ways he's ever known, would love Chyler. It's moments like these where he thinks of her most. Maybe he hasn't completely caught onto what she was trying to tell him, maybe he'd still rather throw himself into the fire than have to watch another person burn, and he still thinks it would be the better call.
But he thinks of her regardless.
She would absolutely love Chyler. She would probably also fit on the list of people better at these moments than he is.)
Finn slides his hands into one of hers, gives it a careful, encouraging squeeze.
Nothing wrong with being human. ]