April System Mingle

[thespaceopera]

Who: Everyone!
Broadcast: Possibly!
Action: April System
When: Month of April!


[Welcome to the Belt, a huge asteroid belt that's been terraformed for life. Here you can explore the different asteroids, become a rock star, race on some ATVs, enjoy not being underwater.

In other words, it's a mingle! Get in everyone!

> System Info ]

Comments

[passingthrough]

[She laughs lightly at that.] Agreed. You know, considering I can walk through walls comfortably it's pretty sad how long it took me to be okay with breathing there. Which was basically never. I'd get distracted for awhile and then right back to feeling like I was going to drown any minute.

[save_the_souls]

[He chuckles] It was the same for me. And the worst was with my hair, it kept getting shades of whatever was in the water I swam through. I must have gone through two shampoo bottles.

[Gross.]

[passingthrough]

You took pictures, I hope.

[save_the_souls]

No. But...there might be recordings on Timcanpy.

[Maybe]

[passingthrough]

[Her eyes light up at that name.] How is Timcanpy? Does he miss me?

[save_the_souls]

He does!

[Not that Timcanpy can talk to say so, but hey Tim is an easy one to please so it's an easy guess]

He's doing well. The cats on the ship don't even try to eat him anymore!

[passingthrough]

[She smiles widely at that even though she doubts there was anything to really indicate that.] I miss him too. Always nice to see people getting along. [Sure, they can be people for this. Why not? She wasn't going to call him a pet.]

How are things on the Blue Fish?

[save_the_souls]

[It's okay Timcanpy totally counts as a people to Allen. He loves his bestie]

It's been fine. Unfortunately we let Sokka buy a pet rock, and now he's scared of it.

What about your ship?

[passingthrough]

I am going to need so much more information about being scared of a rock. A domesticated rock at that. [Smiling.]

The Twin Roses is sailing along, but I think the Windrose may be systematically destroying the Three Twins. Vash is the last one standing after we got smashed together.

[save_the_souls]

Ah, he's convinced the rock is moving on its own. [A wry smile] Truth is, some of the crew are moving it when he's not looking. Don't tell him.

[Because it's funny]

-- Systemically destroying the Three Twins? That's worrying.

[passingthrough]

[The answer gets a laugh.] Your secret is safe. [Plus, she's only ever spoken to Sokka once so what are the odds they'll run into each other anytime soon enough to spoil it?

Talk of the disappearing Three Twins crew is more sobering though.] Yeah. I don't know why the Atroma would go to the work of putting us together just to make four people all from one of the crews disappear. I guess it could just be random chance.

[save_the_souls]

It does seem rather weird... [He frowns, thinking about it.] If only we knew why passengers disappeared when they do.

[passingthrough]

Yeah, that would be nice. It never seemed like there was much of a pattern to it back in Marina either. Sometimes it felt like people from the same world would disappear together. Sometimes they didn't. Sometimes there'd be a lot of losses all at once and sometimes there'd be long periods without any. I had graphs and everything but never got anywhere meaningful with it.

[save_the_souls]

[He nods]

Mm, Paradisa was the same way, though people would come up with different superstitions about it. Like oh if you're quiet, you'll leave faster. Or if you get married to someone you actually want to marry, you'll leave after the wedding. Or if you're name is Kairi, you'll leave a lot.

[he shrugs like he doesn't buy it, even if one is a reason he doesn't want to tie the knot with Clay]

Silly things like that.

[passingthrough]

[She laughs at the specific one and very, very, very deliberately does not think about getting married only to be separated because reasons.] I think I remember a Kairi once. We had more trouble with Elena, Sora, and Kallen. It was like reliving a friendship over and over again in a loop. [Except she was only really friends with the Elenas.]

[save_the_souls]

I recognise those names, I think. [Not as much Elena, but definitely Sora and Kallen] And right, having to introduce yourself over and over...hoping they don't think you're crazy.

[passingthrough]

Or just figuring, "okay, if they think I'm crazy this time I'll just fix it next week when they they're back and they don't remember again." [She was never actually that glib about it.] I'm surprised how many of us have former experience with that stuff here. It was so rare in my last place. [Because there was a rule change later in the game.]

[save_the_souls]

[He makes a snort at that, well aware shes not actually serious about that mentality] Yeah.

Me too. We had no idea in Paradisa other places like this even existed.

[passingthrough]

In Marina we knew it was a larger system of prisons, but...we never actually saw any other prisoners. It was always just us anytime they moved us to another facility. And it wasn't until Chekov and one of the Elena's arrived that anyone talked about other worlds like the prison.

[save_the_souls]

Really?

So you have no idea how many people were actually at the prison...? [Creepy]

[passingthrough]

In the larger system? No. In the specific prison the number probably ran from 50 to 250, ebbing and flowing. Or a lot more if you consider everyone's bodies were still in storage even if their minds weren't connected anymore. [And yes, she absolutely still wonders if she ever left or if they just changed the setting for her.]

[save_the_souls]

-- Their minds weren't-

What?

[THATS DISTURBING. ]

[passingthrough]

To the shared virtual reality. That probably sounded worse than I meant it. Not that it's good. Hey, you know what, don't worry about it. There's enough weird stuff right here without all of that. Have you seen a ung yet? Super weird.

[save_the_souls]

A shared virtual reality- [He pauses] Like that Matrix movie?

[He remembers watching it once, back at Paradisa]

-- Oh, yeah. I've seen those. They look a bit like my crewmate's pet.

[passingthrough]

I did hear the Matrix referenced after it came out, so probably.

Really? Your crewmate has something like that? [Why?] Where did they get theirs?