driftfleet | warning! warning!

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warning! warning!

[The nebulas are beautiful in this region of space, at the very least. They gleam as great distorting clouds of space-stuff that your scanners don't even want to attempt to analyze. They affect the ships' instruments much like other areas of disruption have in the past, but these are actually visible as large swathes of light--like giant flames frozen in their swirling shapes, suspended across impressive stretches of space. For once, there's something like scenery to look at, out here in the black...

And then, the proximity alarms begin to blare.

From a gap between the two nearest clouds comes an assemblage of ships! Familiar to some and new to others--they do not respond to hails or communications of any kind, and they're gunning straight for the Fleet without slowing. Their weapons are locking on and firing as soon as they are in range.

Many passengers have been through this before, and many of the ships are bigger and better than they'd been in the previous skirmish. Today, the Drift Fleet will put up a better fight, even punch a few holes in their attackers.

Your augment knows where you need to go! Do you run to your station? Do you dodge your job? Are you unsure how to help? Are the captains giving orders or panicking, and are their crews paying attention? Everyone's got a chance to fight back before the enemy fleet runs them into the nearest nebula--and things suddenly take a bad turn.

As soon as each Drift Fleet ship hits the nebula, its systems overload and short-circuit before going dead. It stays silent for minutes, no radar, no comms, no network. Stubborn stragglers are ganged up on and forced into the cloud, followed by the poor ships on autopilot being bodily hauled into the nebula with tractor beams. Once the entire Fleet has been set adrift as sitting ducks, before the Marsiva can get too close, the attacking fleet... turns and flees through the cloud, seemingly untouched by the nebula that scrambles your ships.

Eventually, the systems flicker back to life, blinking on one by one. It will be several hours before any other effects of the attack will be noticeable. The network shows up as live again, but Atroma never shows up to explain a thing...]

ooc: the out-of-character event post is over here! respond to this post any way you like; you can have action, comm messages, play during the attack, being stuck in the nebula, checking in after the network comes back online, or whatever else seems fitting.

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[He gives a little snort at that, a half smile coming up despite how he's feeling. Yeah, he knows if he wants to get out of space for a while, then that definitely must say something for all the rest of them.]

Yeah... deep down, I know that. In those few seconds, though? I felt like the worst captain. I couldn't even keep my crew safe, you know?

But I know now that everyone else got pushed here too, whether they've fought these guys before or not. I think I did okay. [His crew's okay, no one's really hurt, and their ship, while damaged, isn't in any danger of falling apart. They did pretty good while missing quite a few key augments.]

I think I just kinda feel like screaming really loud, I guess. Or punching a sandbag. If we had one.

Yeah, I know what you mean. [He's felt that many times through his various jobs] It's a bloody terrible feeling.

[The second worst feeling, right after the one you get when you know you screwed up. But at least it doesn't sound like Clay's beating himself up as much as Sokka (or he does personally) is prone to, so that's something.]

...I'd offer you a punching bag, but I don't think we should be leaving our ships right now. But maybe you should go somewhere your crew can't hear and scream, if it'd make you feel better.

The shuttle hulls are pretty thick.

[He screams pretty loud, though. Maybe if he brought a pillow along and muffled it with that.]

That sounds amazing right now, but I think I'll hold off for a while. Until we actually get somewhere safer. [He gets the nagging feeling that his crew needs him, after all, if only to be a presence. So no screaming just yet.]

But hey. Are you okay?

Okay, but make sure to do it okay? Or punch a sandbag. You may be a captain, but you're still human. [He's seen what happens to people in leadership that ignore that fact. It doesn't end well.]

[There's a pause at Clay's question. Oh right, guess if Clay was honest with him, he should probably be honest back]

I'm... [how to word it; he sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose] It's stupid. I know we were all doing what we had to do, and we should be focusing on making sure our crews are alright, but...

I can't stop feeling sick at the thought that some of our shots hit the attacking ships.

[Ah... yeah. Clay told the ships that they had no means to fire back, yes, but he doesn't like the thought of having guns on his ship. Sure, it means doing more work, but he doesn't want to think of what would happen if he actually fired that at someone. He understands the sentiment completely.]

I don't think it's stupid at all. Yeah, we're defending ourselves, but what about those ships? There are lives in there, too. If some of our shots hit...

[Even if he knows Clay is basically a civilian, that sentiment surprises him a little. It's not exactly a common one in the places he's been in. On the other hand, it's a major relief]

...Mm. I don't know if they took any losses...

On the other hand, the fleet could have taken a lot more damage if we hadn't fought. [He slumps his shoulders a little] ...I'll be fine, I just...I wish we had a chance to talk to them before they attacked.

Edited (BECAUSE I CHANGE WHAT I WANT) 2015-09-16 06:35 (UTC)

Yeah... me too.

[He was even about to do so, even without the communications augment, having not recognized the ships. But then they started firing, and everything just went downhill from there.]

They never gave us a chance to talk. Maybe they could've told us something, why they're attacking, who they're with, I don't know... What would you've asked them?

Me?

[He takes a moment to think on that]

I mean other than that stuff you said...I don't know, if they aren't with Atroma, I'd...want to know what happened to make them travel this far to do this.

[Following them for this long can't have been an easy voyage. If they weren't simply with Atroma, there had to be a reason behind it]

That'd be a good one to ask, if they weren't with Atroma. If there's other places to go in the universe, then why come after us?

[He lets out a sigh, device lowering as he leans his head back against the wall and shuts his eyes. This is all just so confusing and overwhelming.]

I know it'd be asking for trouble, and I don't want the fleet to suffer for it, but... I wish we didn't have guns at all. It makes me feel uneasy. I've seen what they can do to people.

[There's a beat as he tries to figure out how the hell an astronaut would see people getting shot, but...he finally dismisses the confusion. Maybe it's something he's seen from Apollo's case files. Or maybe it's an LA thing. He remembered that city had some rough neighborhoods.]

Mm. I understand what you mean. It's too easy to kill people with guns.

[And that's from someone who has razor sharp claws. But he also sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. This...probably isn't helping either of them, dwelling on this. Not when they can't change any of it at the moment]

[And so, after a pause, he'll try to change the subject]

Hey Clay, why are these clouds in space anyway?

[Please don't cry because the guy you're dating is so clueless]

[He loves to talk about it though, so he'll only cry a little.]

Why are they here? There can be a few reasons behind it, though the most common one is when a cloud of gas in space collapses in on itself, creating ionized gas that can be seen even from light-years away. This makes what we got pushed into: A nebula. All that gas is made up of a high amount of energy that can last for thousands of years, so it's not surprising for everything to shut down while we're in it.

If you want to compare it to something on Earth, you could say those ships pushed us into an intense lightning storm.

So...a nebula is like a storm at sea, except it's in space, lasts thousands of years and is much, much larger?

[huh. Okay. Freaky.]

When you put it that way, it sounds like we're lucky we weren't torn to pieces.

Edited 2015-09-16 22:05 (UTC)

Preeeetty much.

My guess is that the metal of our ships conducted the ionized energy, which might be the reason they didn't completely fall apart. It's possible that the material and general shapes of the ships resisted the flow of it, enough to keep itself intact, but not enough to keep all of our mechanical and electrical equipment from overloading. Everything's relatively fine now, but I'm betting we'll still see the effects of it for a little while longer, depending on how hard the ship was hit. And since it was hit by a nebula... It could take weeks for everything to fully recover. That's my estimate, at least.

Edited (I EDIT WHAT I WANT) 2015-09-17 06:39 (UTC)

Weeks? [And we're lucky that it's just that? Shiiiiiiiit.] That's insane. I'm grateful we might be able to fly to a waystation or planet, but Sokka and Hiro might give themselves heart attacks trying to fix everything else.

[Glitchy computers and lights, that's going to be his dear captain and nephew's end. But speaking of heart attacks-]

If a nebula can do that much damage to our equipment, how unhealthy is it for us to be near that much ionized gas? [And wait-] And what about our augments? They're electrical too!

Edited 2015-09-17 17:24 (UTC)

I think we'll be fine. These ships have seen better days, yeah, but they did their job when it came to protecting us from the nebula. [He gives the floor an appreciative pat; sure, Vanquish is pretty junky compared to, say, Blue Fish, but hey, it's still his baby.]

As for our augments... Yeah, we might see a few glitches from them, too. They're connected right to us, so - hey, you're lab support, right? You might expect people to talk about aches and pains from that area. Take all of that with a grain of salt; I mean, someone can wear a watch when lightning strikes their house and their wrist is fine. But something like an augment under our skin...

Edited (allen is not lap support) 2015-09-18 05:39 (UTC)

That's a relief to hear. [And he sounds so. Side effects of nebulae wasn't exactly in his medical education] Thank you for your hard work, ships. [He makes a mental note to tell Sokka some of this too. He'll appreciate knowing how much Blue Fish shielded her crew. ]

[The bit about the augments though, not so much. He takes what Clay says for consideration, and adds-]

...Under our skin and connected to our central nervous systems, you mean. [Brilliant job Atroma, really] Aches and pains aren't so bad, but last time the augments glitched they caused erratic behaviours and moods from people. Nothing too dangerous, but it's probably worth keeping in mind if any of your crew start acting strangely.

Right, I will. I haven't actually seen an augment glitch happen before, so thanks for letting me know. [This way, he won't be too caught off guard if his crew - or he himself - acts strangely. He can't help rubbing at the back of his neck uncomfortably at that; shit's weird, man.]

Hey... be careful, okay? I'll see you when we're on more solid ground.

[Awww Clay. There's a pause before he responds in a more reassuring tone]

Of course. I'll be fine. We all will. Especially with you around to let us know what to expect. [Seriously, just knowing what's going on helps ease Allen's nerves- even if it's not great news] Thank you for that.

Just please go find a spot to scream. And then we'll have a nice date on solid ground when we reach a planet. Okay?

Edited 2015-09-18 21:50 (UTC)

[There's a pause on his end as well before he smiles, more to make himself feel better than anything.]

Yeah, we'll be fine! WE'RE FINE!

I'm expecting the worst movie possible from you, okay?

[Whoa- he has to pull his communicator away from his ear when Clay shouts. That guy sure has volume. But it makes him chuckle a little]

Yes, we're fine!

Don't worry, provided my television still works- I won't settle for anything less than atrocious.

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warning! warning!

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