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Who: Rick Grimes & You.
Broadcast: Fleetwide.
Action: On the special part of the ship for the Calibrations.
When: Until his ship placement.

[ Ever since Negan entered into his life, things were all turned upside down and nothing made any sort of sense. But his current predicament took things to a whole new level and he really didn't know what plan of action to use first. He needed a direction to go in but for any to work he first needed information. The strange communication device and the broadcast capabilities seemed his best chance at the moment.

Letting out a deep sigh, he sat down and readied himself, attempting to appear not as frantic or angry by his current situation. In the very least, the scent of blood had faded but the chill lingered as if it seeped too deeply down inside of him. Would the screams ever leave when he happened to fall asleep?

In space. Why would he ever believe in such a thing? It just couldn't be possible. ]

I've had my fill of this and I need to return to my daughter with my people. Things are - the rest of the group needs me. [ A deep sigh passed his slightly cracked lips. ] What is this place? Where am I now? There isn't any information here.

[ Sitting up straighter, he tilted his head to the side. ] What are the demands? The terms of this? [ A negotiation always existed for things and Rick had a lot of experience making them. ]

( action. )

[ Later on, he can be found trying to comb every inch of the place for clues and information. In general, making a complete mess of things. ]

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[Just trying to run toward something rather than going back to die. But if getting everyone else home meant putting herself back there, she'd do it.]

Nothing concrete. Most people believe they go home. It's the most optimistic possibility most of the time, so I think that's why it's popular. I guess some people come back remembering more things from home too, but sometimes people stay and remember more things from home too, so all that really tells us is that they might not be getting killed.

[Her last abduction turned out to be a shared virtual reality and she was there a loooong time before it was discovered, so part of her has always suspected that's what this is too. Maybe she wasn't in a different place, just getting a new program. It'll mess with your perception of reality.]

We got moved over here about a week ago. It's usually just for new arrivals. [She laughs at his last question.] You know it would be faster to ask me what isn't odd.

[ The memories thing perplexed him the most because it really didn't make sense. He understood all about suppression but there were certain things no one could easily shut on and off. How would returning home simply unlock hidden memories or experiences? They were missing something and Rick needed to figure it out. ]

Are any of these memory recollections shared? Or does the person disappear alone or fall asleep alone?

[ Nodding his head, he looked over at the counter again for a moment. There weren't any hidden clues in the kitchen area but the toothpaste like food substance might be something. Who created it? What did it do to those who ate it?

Something ingested worked far quicker than any other means. ]

Did the augment make you see or remember things that seem different? Like you shouldn't have known them to begin with?

The memory jumps can happen either way. I had four friends who had it happen at the same time. I'm not sure if any of them were physically together when it happened or not. Probably. They were couples.

[She remembers doing this questioning when she arrived. She doesn't mind doing some answering. It's a nice distraction from the calibrations.]

Mm, it does that to everyone. I'm used to learning alien tech, but that was quick even for me.

[She starts getting some coffee ready.]

[ Memory jumps? It sounded again like a science fiction novel but he needed to keep a somewhat open mind if he wanted to hear people's opinions on things. They might be wrong with their conclusions but their viewpoint would add another layer to the growing amount of mysteries.

He nodded his head for a moment, not too bothered until she mentioned ALIEN. ]

Like from another country? [ It didn't occur to him she might mean martians or anything of the sort. He thought she meant foreign or from another culture of some sort. ] You've never tried to alter it? Remove it? Figure out why it's there for? [ He refused to just go along with things, clearly. ]

Well, that too, but I meant another planet. I'm guessing there isn't a lot of space travel where you're from?

[Letting the water boil.]

I've tried. It got...messy. It was unsuccessful. There've been other attempts too. I thought we had a good shot at it. [Her phasing and Logan's healing factor felt like something they'd be stupid not to try.]

[ With everything else he dealt with so far, space travel shouldn't have racked high on the troubling list but somehow it did. Back home, people once traveled to the moon and attempted Mars but never really found anything. ]

Just to the moon, Earth's moon I mean. And to Mars. [ He paused for a moment, considering. ] Where're you from? It have a lot of traveling in space?

[ He nodded his head with a deepening frown. ] What happened to those who tried it? They alright? [ It really put a damper on his future plans for things. ] Anyone ever find a way to manipulate 'em? Or has that not worked either?

Chicago. [Deerfield technically.] On an Earth. They pull people from different realities. Parallel dimensions? Many worlds theory? [Just throwing out various terms he might have heard of.] We had contact with some aliens. Shi'ar, Kree, Skrulls. [Waves her hand as if to say "etcetera".] And the means for space travel. [The governments hadn't gotten much further than what he mentioned but there were people like Lila Cheney with mutant powers that could traverse the distance or more independent areas of technological advancement.] But Earth was a mess and they were mostly just staying out of it I think.

[She looks at him curiously.] Still with me? Questioning my sanity?

[She knows there's more to answer about what happened with the augments. She'll get there. She just knows this other part is already a lot to take in.]

[ With a mostly open minded, he listened to her explanation, but he became more and more incredulous by the moment. Yes, it really sounded like a really bad science fiction film. But he couldn't really explain away his current situation either without it also sounding like something out of, well, the world. ]

The -- people here are able to take people from different realities and bring 'em here. [ The words sounded more like a statement than a question, his face furrowed in concentration of the possibility of it all. ] At different points in time, I'm guessin'. Is that why some can remember only certain things?

[ For now, he left the 'aliens' thing alone. ] Do the augments make people see things they shouldn't be seein'?

Yes, that's why people end up remembering different things. Either because they're from a different point in time or a different, but similar reality. [Which she has to throw in because that's so much of her life. Always meeting people with the same names and powers, but their whole life story could be different from what she expects.] The only person from the exact same world as me was also from a few years into the future. [Where she was busy being dead anyway.]

The augments... Well, they can do a lot of things. Your basic, daily thing is what you already brought up about having more skills and knowledge about things in the fleet than you should have. They can also malfunction assuming they're really malfunctions, and in those cases they can change you in a variety of ways. For instance, suddenly being a child is a popular glitch. Which affects your mind and your body. And is a lot harder for me to wrap science around than the different realities bit. [It could all be a shared virtual reality like her last abduction, but that's a line of thought she doesn't necessarily like inflicting on other people. And it could be a dangerous misdirection if it is something else.]

Anyway, I'm sure it could make someone see something they shouldn't be seeing, but it's not really something I've heard about yet? Do you feel like that's happening to you?

[ The headache pierced sharply through his mind as he tried to contend and take in the information. It really didn't make sense, at least, in a sane sort of way but chaos tended to fill his daily life ever since he woke up from the coma and this didn't appear to be any different. The dead had started to rise again, how could he simply look past anything else being possible. With a nod of his head, he leaned against the counter slightly. ]

This means, time and realities are all different, then? Not very linear. [ It really, really hurt his head. ] The point in time I'm from, others might be different? [ The possibility clenched his heart because what if the rest of his family arrived and they didn't really know each other? It could cause more than a few issues. ] None of your people are here? I mean, ones you knew before you were taken? [ How lonely that must be. ]

[ Hold on now. ] The augments cause physical changes? Not just illusions or hallucinations? [ The urge to rid himself of the thing burned hotter but she claimed no one managed it correctly. ] The people who changed, did they forget all memories up to that point? They didn't remember any adult things?

[ He shook his head. ] Nah, just wonderin' if it was possible is all.

That's the situation. [She nods along until he asks if none of her people are here.] Kurt's here. We're teammates back home. What's a couple of years difference in a place like this, right? [So not exactly the same, but close enough that she's counting it.] And then there's Pavel. He and I were in another place like this. Different mysterious overlords. Prison in an underwater dome set up instead of a reality show in space.

[Her life is so weird. But hey, the coffee is ready. She grabs a cup for herself.] Want some?

[Nodding again.] I think everyone I've run into who became a kid had their memories regress, but not all physical changes do that. [She'll skip the part where she had a biologically male body for a week, but was otherwise herself.] It can probably work however they want it to.

[ Each new piece of information she offered really clued Rick into how much she went through in the past. All the experiences could make her an asset for things and she had been there for awhile. It kind of tore away at his hope for arriving back home but for now he'd contend with what he found right in front of him. Everything else would fall into place. ]

You ever figure out who those overlords were? [ The reality show bit really confused him but he had never enjoyed such shows before the world ended. In his reality. ] Do they make everybody do things? It bein' a show and all?

[ He nodded his head about the coffee, idly wondering if he should drink or eat anything in the strange place. What if it made things worse for him? ] Thank ya.

Another reason to get these things gone. It gives too much control to whoever is in power here.

We just called them the wardens. Artificial intelligence who ran the place, but there were engineers who built them and then people who oversaw the engineers. No idea how high up it went. Might have been the Atroma for all I know.

We all have jobs assigned to us here, but there's really no penalty for ignoring it. All we really have to do is drift along with the fleet.

[She passes him the cup she originally poured for herself and then gets a new one out for her. She wants to ask more about him and she will, but she knows when she first showed up in one of these places she had questions she had to get out. She didn't want to just make friends or even alliances. She needed information to feel any remote level of control or security. And her life was already full of weird. She can't say about him, but she's pretty sure she's throwing some curve balls his way.

Yeah, she was supposed to talk about her attempt at augment removal wasn't she?]

They have built-in safe guards against taking them out—your own or someone else's. For instance, if you get serious about removal you'll be suddenly terrified. Like the frozen-in-place kind even if you've got some history with fighting through things like that. [It really threw her just how hard it was to fight past it.] It's not the only thing it can trigger and then just on a medical level it's utterly intertwined with things you need to keep from being brain dead.]

I thought we had a real shot at it though. The perfect power line up for making it happen. I was sure people had tried cutting it out before, but no one could do what we could do.

[ If there weren't any penalties for not completing assigned tasks, Rick really failed to understand the possible motivation for trapping them all. If there were certain things to complete then it gave an objective, which would lead to the possible motive. Every living being existed with motivations and reasons for doing the things even if they never really understood why. Law enforcement often stepped in to put together the pieces if necessary but usually people kept to their own lives moving along from one place to the next. One motivation building upon another over and over again. ]

Are there a lot of other -- ships? [ It really felt odd to say they were on ships because he really couldn't believe it. ]

[ He nodded his head, taking the coffee cup with a faint 'thank you' before he took a sip. It warmed him up slightly but it couldn't shake the nagging worry resting far too deeply within him.

Something was coming, he just felt it in his bones. ]

Must mean they got some kinda technology to implant things. Some clues 'bout who might really be behind all this. They've got to have some bigger reason for the implants. [ Beyond just mindlessly controlling them and making them see things. ] Or maybe we're just playthings to them.

Sixteen ships people usually live on. One ship everyone shares for recreation and business called the Iskaulit and the ship we're on now. Plus, the shuttles. Not sure how many of those total.

[She takes a drink for herself, watching him process things.] Playthings is kind of the party line on it. But yeah, technology to affect a variety of people with different powers and genetic structures and technology to abduct people from all over the multiverse. They are sufficiently advanced. [It's not exactly beyond the realm of what she's seen before especially considering it's not her first abduction rodeo, but the way they've held on to the power without showing a lot of points of weakness has been impressive.

She cocks her head and considers him.]

So, Rick Grimes, where are you from? You sound ~~British~~ southern American? [Not quite like Paige or Rogue's accents though.]

[ The sound of sixteen ships made his heart sink a little in his chest because it widened the scope of the investigation. Before the world ended, at least in his timeframe, the station dealt with a rather large underground network of thugs, leading them to a cluster of warehouses. It took them so long to cover all the ground and try to not miss any of the important details. One single misstep could be the difference to closing a case or letting it go cold. ]

A lot of area to investigate. Have all of you documented the ships and compared any differences? [ He took a sip of the coffee. ] Might be somethin' there.

[ The multi-verse kept throwing him for a loop but he needed to wrap his mind around it to focus on what came next. He really needed to figure out who held the most power, how and why. ]

Kentucky and Georgia. [ His head tilted to the side as he regarded her with a soft smile. ] Those places mean anythin' to ya? Or do you have different places where you're from?

Probably? It's all a little scattered but there are people who record various things. [Not her though. At least not about that detail.

She laughs softly when he asks if they mean anything to her. There's really nothing to laugh at. She's the one who explained people could be from anywhere after all.] Yeah, I'm from Chicago. I know the states. One of my students was from Kentucky. [Nevermind the fact Kitty probably doesn't look old enough to have had students of any kind.]

There's a good chance the state of those states is pretty different between our worlds though. It's always hard figuring out a way to ask someone what their world is like. Big question.

[ For such a dire situation, no one appeared too organized so far with an investigation. Were they too scared? Had they fallen into a state of compliance? The latter he saw plenty on the job and it went along with stockholm syndrome. People in captive eventually learned to cope with it and in some cases enjoy it. There were a few cases he heard where the captive wanted to return to their captor and tried to do everything in their power to do so. ]

You were a teacher? [ She looked a bit young but maybe in her world they aged differently. ]

[ He nodded his head, quickly explaining the highlights about his world - the foundation for America, the wars, the democracy and how they came to be. ] Dead started risin' few years back. Found out we were all infected and if ya died, you'd become a walker yourself. No cure as far as I knew. [ He paused for a moment. ] Was a lot of trouble with things.

I've been a lot of things. [~~Comics time is extremely questionable.~~]

[She tips her head, listening to him. It should sound like a pretty unbelievable story really, but she's not sure what it would take to feel really unbelievable anymore. Plus, she's heard this one before.]

That is definitely a good descriptor. Do you know someone named Carol or Carl? [Wow, those are hard to say back to back.]

Carl is my son. Carol is someone in my group. [ The words were nearly said in a rush and all jumbled together in his haste to voice them. Did she know them? Every piece of information having to do with his family mattered more to him than anything else. They happened to be his greatest strength and also his biggest weakness. Being separated from all of them nearly tore him up inside because he couldn't protect them. ]

Do you know 'em? [ He paused, thoughtfully and took another sip of the coffee. ] Must be a lot of people here.

[ He took another sip. ] What do you consider yourself now?

Ah. Well, good to meet you. [As if she hadn't already.]

Yeah, I met them both in the place I was at before this one. Carl's here too, but he doesn't have any memories of Marina. [No easy explanations ever.

She shifts the coffee in her hands and glances at her ring.] That is an excellent question. Tired mostly.

[ Wrapping his head around things proved incredibly difficult, especially the fact there were other space locations. Carl being involved and not having memories troubled him further. ]

Wonder how many memory wipes they do. [ A frown pulled at his lips and he drank a little more of the coffee to try and keep more of the troubling thoughts to himself. ] Wish we were meetin' in better circumstances.

[ He nodded his head, setting the cup of coffee down. ] Just gotta be more organized with things. Everybody lookin' into things, making notes and collectin' data. It's gotta be concrete and more hidden. Can't just rely on rememberin' it.

Who knows. [She's not sure if it is memory wipes or a combination of those and people from very similar parallel worlds or pulling the same person from different points in time to confuse the issue, but she doesn't throw those uncertainties in just yet. There's enough here already. She does smile at his wish though.] Could be worse. Could be surrounded by flesh-hungry dead people.

And you're not wrong about the data. It's just complicated in a place like this. We tried a system like that in the last place I was in. [She founded and led that system, not that she mentions it.] We never really gained any ground even with a team trying to track everything and identify trends. After awhile I think it was harder on morale than if we weren't working on it.

[ A smile twitched at his lips because so far the place appeared to be walker-less. He wouldn't let his guard down, though, just in case since it seemed too good to be true. What happened to all the walkers? Did everyone flee into 'space' to get away from them? He always hoped eventually they would find a way to reclaim life away from them.

The smile slid off his face when she continued talking about the data. ]

I've found doin' somethin' helps people have a motivation. [ To keep moving forward when things looked bleakest. ] Not doin' anythin' - don't know how that'd help with how to get back home. Or figure out what they're doin' to us.

Yeah, that's how I expected it to work too. [Maybe it's how it should have worked and it's probably how it did work for most of those doing it, but for the people who opted out of helping, they were hyper critical of them for not fixing everything and making life better immediately. Problem is, it's hard to make quick progress with an intractable, overpowered enemy that knows everything about you and has absolute control over you. Showing people a binder of information with some charts doesn't really cut it. And it was hard on her personally because back home when people hated her for devoting her life to protecting them it was for being a mutant and they were strangers. But in the prison it was coming from friends. When she got transferred here she just wanted her life to be about more than fighting the impossible fight.]

But you're right. Nothing changes if we change nothing. [Something she's been getting back to recently. Break time's over.]

[action]

ringleadering - 2017-07-27 03:25 (UTC) - Expand

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