( 002 » ENSEMBLE ) gravitational.

[reveriemod]

» WHO? EVERYONE
» WHEN? JUNE 1 onward
» WHERE? ALL OVER THE STATION (literally)
» WHAT? Gravity is always on, until it isn't.
» WARNINGS? zero g, paralysis, the vacuum of space, possible asphyxiation, possible character death

0 0 1 » LOSS OF GRAVITY

The outer rings of Reverie Station rotate around the shaft of the station, using inertial forces to simulate gravity. One moment, this works fine — people are walking along corridors, sleeping in their beds, eating in the mess hall or having a drink at the bar. The next moment? In some parts of the station, a crunching sound can be heard, like metal against metal, and shortly thereafter, the rings cease to spin, causing a jolt to go through all rings.

And then what passed for gravity just stops.

Your food, drink or blanket might have floated off after the jolt. Remember to engage your mag boots, if you're wearing them, lest you follow suit. Good luck getting around in zero g.

( ♪ )

0 0 1 . 1 » UPSIDE DOWN AND FLOATING

The lack of gravity may be disorienting at first for those not used to operating in zero g environments. Fortunately, mag boots mean you can continue walking along corridors — though the boots will engage with what used to be the ceiling of the corridors as much as what used to be the floor. No matter which part of the corridor you're attached to, if any, better make sure to collect anything that may be floating around, lest it becomes a dangerous projectile whenever gravity turns back on.

The mess hall and the gym area in particular are in a significant state of disarray. In the mess hall, some cutlery (of the grey, hard plastic variant) has been left unsecured and is floating harmlessly through the air. The same holds true for a large amount of protein powder. In the gym area, meanwhile, the entirety of the dirty water from the pool is no longer in the pool.

( ☺︎ )

0 0 1 . 2 » PARALYSIS INDOORS

One moment, you’re walking — or maybe you’re floating, mag boots disengaged. Either way, from one moment to the next, you become unable to move. Your arms, your legs, even wiggling a toe becomes a thing of impossibility. There’s a heavy weight on your chest, despite the fact that gravity is still not back on. Taking a breath is an ordeal. You can’t call for help, you can’t signal to anyone, you can only stay still.

( ♪ )

OOC: The length of paralysis is up to players.

0 0 2 » TAKE A WALK ON THE WILD SIDE

It isn't clear why the rotation of the rings has stopped and gravity ceased, but one thing is certain: life on the station is a lot more difficult without gravity, especially for those not used to living and working in a zero g environment. The sensible thing would be to fix whatever is wrong, but in order to do that, you have to figure out what's wrong first.

One way to get an idea might be to put on a suit (if required) and go out an airlock to have a close look at the upper ring, where the crunching noise could be heard the loudest. The objective is to identify the problem and, if possible, fix it — but unless you have the power of flight and can breathe in the vacuum of space, the walk from the airlock to surveying the ring will be taxing in and of itself.

Better not lose hold of the station or each other and whatever you do, do not disengage those mag boots. Hopefully, no debris will come flying at you. The station may be built to withstand it, but you aren't.

( ♪ )

OOC: There are some 20 vac suits with oxygen packs and small thrusters for (weak) propulsion available in the spaces currently accessible to characters; these can be found in various airlocks.

0 0 2 . 1 » FLOATING AROUND

The station may be built to withstand debris, but you aren't — which makes it all the more unfortunate that some debris does catch you. In the side, in the face or in the legs, it doesn't matter: what matters is that the impact is strong enough to disengage the mag boots, which means you are now floating in space.

Did your suit take damage? Do its thrusters still work, or not? Is your oxygen pack still connected properly? If your connection to the station network is still intact, now would be a good time to call for help and hope that someone's close enough to get to you in time before you float too far from the station to still be reached, before your oxygen runs out, before any possible injuries you may have sustained take their toll.

( ♪ )

OOC: With this prompt, the extent of possible injuries, the time before rescue and factors such as oxygen or damage to the suit are all up to players. Please keep in mind that character death is very much a possibility — but that death means relatively little. Should a character die from their injuries or lack of oxygen, they will awaken again. As per the death mechanism outlined in the FAQ, characters are brought back to life (possibly repeatedly, if rescue takes a while), but they lose something. What they lose is up to players as well (a limb, memories, senses, social skills, ...) and the duration of the loss can range from a few days to permanent loss.

0 0 2 . 2 » PARALYSIS OUTDOORS

One moment, you are walking along the hull of the station. The next, you're frozen. Your arms and legs no longer move and there's pressure on your chest. Even taking a breath becomes an ordeal. You cannot move forward. You cannot move back. You can't even signal or call for help.

What choice do you have but to wait out this paralysis and hope that it loses its hold on you before your oxygen runs out? Better not panic, lest you use up more of it.

( ♪ )

OOC: The length of paralysis is up to players.

0 0 3 » WORK IT

For those who've successfully made the walk across the hull of the station to find the problem, it will soon become obvious what has happened: debris crashed into the station and got lodged between the uppermost ring and the shaft of the station, where it is stuck, preventing the spinning of the ring.

You will need to work together to cut through the debris or dislodge it. It's heavy, and you have little leverage in the absence of gravity.

Keep in mind also that if you successfully dislodge the debris, the outer ring will start moving again. Be prepared, especially if you're still connected to the ring by your mag boots. Inertial forces can be quite strong, so you will need to brace yourself or risk being dislodged yourself.

( ♪ )

Comments

[thefaulty]

[Even at a closer angle, it takes a moment for Arid to grasp what she’s really seeing. And even then, she doesn’t understand how it’s happening. Metal does not bleed, nor can it turn to blood on a human’s whim—except, apparently, it does.

Arid watches as the woman continues, completely at a loss for how to understand the process, but nonetheless appreciating that it seems to be loosening the stuck debris significantly. When the woman straightens up, Arid takes that as a sign that she’s done all she can at the moment.

That means it’s Arid’s turn. She takes the woman’s place in front of the debris and starts to make a few experimental prods at the pieces the woman has shortened, looking for any leverage that the extra space has bought. When she finds a loosened piece, she does her best to ease it out of its place. It’s slow work, slower than the woman’s strange abilities and more physically demanding. Of course, Arid doesn’t tire, nor does she have any need to stop and catch her breath. She manages to pull, twist, and tear a few pieces free, though the ring still isn’t moving. She turns and looks back at the woman, gesturing to her hands and then back at the debris. Can she repeat the process she’d done earlier again?]

[veristitalian]

[She can. She comes back in, and runs her glove along a bar, giving it a shake, trying to find what she was looking for last time, that place where things are extremely stuck.

When she finds it, she makes another pass with stormlight. From close up, Arid will be able to see how it works a little better. First a glow passes through space, phosphorescence sliding from Jasnah into the metal she's working on, and then where the light comes the metal changes. This time the liquid she produces is black and oily, spattering both of them with pitch.]

[thefaulty]

[Arid watches again, tracking the light as it passes through the metal. Could this be some kind of experimental deconstruction technology? She can think of no other explanation as the metal melts away into black pitch, spattering them both and floating away into the airless void.

The question will have to wait for later. Once the human is done, Arid steps forward to repeat the process she had followed earlier, removing and loosening debris where she can. It takes another several more minutes to make a significant dent in the debris. She's just finishing when her efforts are interrupted by a tremor through the station below her. Arid can feel it through the soles of her boots and though sound cannot travel through space, she knows that if there were any atmosphere, her audio processing would be overwhelmed by the screech and groan of twisting metal. The mass of debris before them begins to buckle in places, and the twitching of the station beneath them intensifies. Arid steps back quickly, motioning with one arm for the human to do the same. The tremors continue for about half a minute more before settling.

She looks back at the human and gives a tense nod, before pointing back in the direction they had come. They’ve clearly made progress chipping away at the blockage. But with that progress comes instability and they’d be wise to return inside until the ring is stable once again.]

[veristitalian]

[She's used all her stormlight anyways. Jasnah comes forward, making the careful locking steps, one after the other, along the surface of the station. She'd like to be out of here, and back inside right now.

At the very least she wants to get into a non moving part of the station. There's a shockwave through the metal under her feet, as a piece breaks off, and Jasnah glances quickly over her shoulder to ascertain that it's spinning off away from them. She picks up her step.]

[thefaulty]

[Arid keeps pace with Jasnah, silently keeping track of the time between each tremor. Though that much stays fairly consistent—one every two-and-a-half minutes, approximately—the intensity of each is growing stronger. It’s a good sign as far as progress goes as it indicates that whatever force compels the ring to rotate is still operational. However, it is not ideal for anyone walking along the outside of the station. At several points, Arid stops to grab hold of the human’s arm to steady both of them and to prevent either of them from being shaken off the station’s exterior.

After a long, tense trek, the airlock finally comes into view. Arid picks up her pace, though she still remains in arm’s length of the human should another tremor threaten to dislodge them.]

[veristitalian]

[She can't run in these boots, but she comes as close as she can, ducking into the airlock in kind of a scramble. Her footing finally slips, but she's inside, and can grab for a wall fixture, hang on with her hands, if not her feet.

The rush of air in around them is a blessed relief.

[thefaulty]

[Arid is less eager than Jasnah, waiting for the human to enter the decompression chamber before entering herself. Even as the airlock closes behind them and the small room fills with air, she doesn’t remove her helmet. Instead, she turns to Jasnah and speaks, her electronic voice showing no signs of breathlessness or fatigue.]

You are unharmed?

[Humans are so fragile, it can be hard to tell.]

[veristitalian]

I am.

[She agrees, straightening up and looking at her more curiously. Another machine, another opportunity to learn more about how this strange alternate form of life works.]

Thank you for your assistance. I am Jasnah Kholin.

[thefaulty]

[Arid does not respond with her own name. She is beginning to accept that many of the organics here do not seem to take issue with AI having their own names, but she is not foolhardy enough to assume that all of them feel the same way. It would be wiser to learn more about Jasnah and her views before potentially endangering herself.]

Your assistance was also appreciated, [she responds instead.] I have not seen such technology used before.

[veristitalian]

It is not technology.

[Answers Jasnah, who has seen enough of the stuff now to be able to classify the difference.]

What should I call you?

[thefaulty]

I am the A.R.I.D aboard a mark-7 combat suit. [A pause.] Some prefer to call me “Arid.”

[She prefers it as well, however cagey she is about admitting it.]

What did you use to liquefy the debris if not technology? [Arid is no expert on human biology, but she is quite certain that they do not possess that ability naturally.]

[veristitalian]

Arid.

[Echoes Jasnah, politely. She begins getting out of her suit, gloves, then chest plate. There's no use in contemplating going out there now.]

I use stormlight. Unfortunately, that was all of it that I had, so I can't show you or demonstrate.

[thefaulty]

[It is with some relief Arid sees that the human does not appear to take issue with the informal name. She listens as Jasnah explains her ability, still not quite understanding what she means. The only thing she really grasps is that this “stormlight” is something that can be depleted.]

Is “stormlight” a manner of resource?

[veristitalian]

It is. It's renewable, but it needs to be contained carefully for us to access it, and I don't have any way to replenish it on board- except for what I find here and there about the station.

[Admitting, with a frustrated shake of her head.]

It's very limited quantities.

[thefaulty]

[Interesting. Arid has never heard of this resource before, but given what seem to be its highly corrosive properties, it may prove useful for accessing the station’s blocked areas.]

Are you the only human resident trained in stormlight’s use?

[veristitalian]

I am the only one capable of using it on board so far.

[She agrees, with an incline of her head.]

I hold out hope that others will arrive.

[thefaulty]

[It is a strange hope, Arid thinks. Generally when there’s a limited supply of a resource, humans want less competition, not more.]

What does stormlight look like in its stored form? If I find any on the station, I can deliver it to you.

[Perhaps if she finds enough, Jasnah can use it to gain access to the station’s hangar.]

[veristitalian]

I think that would be impossible, but I appreciate the thought.

[And, as she strips down, she can show her the sphere she'd brought out there with her. It's a small ball of glass, with a tiny chip suspended inside it. It's a sapphire.]

If this held stormlight, it would glow, softly.