Not with a Bang Start and Ongoing

[voidtreckermods]

"Good Morning passengers. Today is day seven of the month of Imagination." The voice echoes through the train as passengers wake up in their beds. Not long afterwards their SCA’s glow with the colour of the void and a holographic image will appear.

Preperation

They have about an hour to prepare, a little less than usual but perhaps expected, given the urgency of the task.

The cupboards in the dressing room are open to reveal rows of tents, in all four team colours as well as some basic camp cooking equipment. They are in bags that should be easy enough to carry.

"Shortly arriving on System #6416. All passengers get ready to disembark. Next stop world 6416. Exit from void in ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one." The train rocks and lurches, bright colours of the void filling the space and then fading as they fly downwards towards a very green landscape.

Arrival and Initial Task

The train lands in a clearing, curving round in an attempt to fit. Once everyone who wishes to disembark has done it flies back into the air, vanishing from sight.

The air is heavy and humid, though it is not currently raining. The clearing is open to the sky and looking up will reveal a worrying sight. The sky is an angry red colour, colours shifting as if the clouds themselves were on fire. It's an unnerving sight.

Their SCA's show three points, one Orange, One purple and one that is half blue and half red. The three control centres. Each are a few hours treck through the jungle and it certainly feels like there is no time to waste.

Those that don't want to treck through the forest can start setting up camp, though the darkening sky might be a little distracting. As time goes on flecks of fire drift down, though they extinguish before hitting the forest floor.

Orange are to travel to the north, Purple to the south and Blue and Red must travel together to the west. Each route takes them through thick and unrelenting jungle. Flying is difficult here unless you can get up past the canopy layer, which means vision of the ground is severely hampered.

The control stations themselves are half buried in vines and require cutting into. If voidtreckers are unlucky they will meet their first security robots here, firing on the intruders. They might even meet their first giant Armadillos, the creatures are curious and may wish to investigate. They are not helpful or constructive to trying to power up the stations and prevent the destruction of the planet.

The control stations are simple enough to operate, but there's quite a lot that needs to be done in way of repairs and clearing. It will take a team effort to get it in working enough order to activate the shield.

The shield itself, when it is activated, is mostly invisible but there is a loud humming sound. The meteor, which has gotten more visible throughout the five hours, hits the shield and splinters, fire enveloping the whole sky. It is visibly terrifying, but no fire falls to earth, no rocks get through, the planet is safe.

Ongoing

Once the planet is safe the voidtreckers deserve a rest. But once the next morning dawns it is time to start with their next tasks, to make sure that this planet stays safe from future threats.

Red

The robots at the control stations are not the only malfunctioning security robots around. They roam the jungle, or are more often stranded in the jungle, powering up only when faced with a new threat.

Some are benign, terraforming machines whose only crime is using up precious power. These need to be dismantled so that power can be saved for the shield system. Others are security robots that will attack the intruders to the planet.

Though the machines are scattered they are often obvious, emitting warning alarms or flashing lights. Their SCA's will show some areas where there are larger clusters but machines can be found anywhere.

Purple

Their SCA's are filled with hundreds of purple dots, each a solar stations that needs cleared and brought back online. It's not the most glamourous job, the stations are deep in the jungle, the treck is difficult and most of the work needed is weed clearing.

But once the weeds have been cut away they will need to patch up the station, doing basic maintenance to get it back online. In some cases wires need to be patched back together but it shouldn't take any great feats of engineering to get the stations up and running.

They may run into some of the security automatons, needing to fight their way into the stations before they can begin the clean up operations.

Orange

Like the red team their SCA will show areas where there are clusters of the small insectoid automatons that need to be rescued and restored. However they can be found anywhere throughout the jungle, they are not too suited for the terrain outside of the stations and so they have gotten tangled in vines. They can be found powered down, stranded and in dire need of maintenance.

Tools and spare parts can be found in many of the solar stations that purple team have been locating. Actually repairing the robots takes some engineering knowledge but once they are restored they will go about their tasks in the stations. They will need help getting to the further flung stations as well as the main control centres.

They are very basic in design and follow pre programmed instructions rather than being able to hear and listen to orders. But once in the correct place they are very effective at their job.

Blue

Once the shield is up there is a faint humming that can be heard throughout the jungle if they listen closely and find it among the sound of rain and insects. But once they hear it, it is obvious where it is louder and more prominent.

Their SCA will pin point some of the larger control boxes but there are truthfully too many to show on a map. Not all of them have attracted Violet Pandas, but many of them have.

They are curious creatures, both of the power boxes and the voidtreckers. They are protective of each other but not so much of territory and therefore it is not difficult to move them on. Keeping them away is another matter, the power humming is interesting and they will unearth wires and chew through them. It doesn't seem to do them much harm, there is clearly safety stops in the system for such eventualities. It does however cut power off to entire solar stations and require a lot of patch work.

Good luck voidtreckers!

Comments

[its_dad_sanzo]

Koumyou didn't seem to notice anything amiss, but he rarely showed his cards like that so it was hard to tell. There he was, sitting up against a convenient rock in his little lean-to, all bundled up, just as content as could be. Humming to himself, he wiggled his arms out of the sleeping bag to dig into his backpack beside him, producing a pair of cups taken from the train.

Yeah. Two of them.

"Would you like some tea?"

No, he had no idea who had crept up on his little camp site, but whether it was his wards or something more mundane-- he knew someone was out there in the dark.

[knifewithnoname]

She saw him pull out two cups and a glance around his small camp showed no other people so she was disappointed but not surprised when he addressed her.

He was a priest though and if he was anything like the priests in her world it wasn't even a surprise that he had known she was there. She moved out of the bush, trying not to look too guilty.

"Yes please."

He couldn't be too mad, if he had offered her tea.

[its_dad_sanzo]

Koumyou went about making their tea, pouring the water carefully from the small cooking pot into their cups and adding the appropriate things from his bag. Including teabags, because one couldn't deny how portable these were!

He offered the cup up with his trademark squinty smile.

"I haven't tried this kind before," Koumyou warned, "it may not be very good."

[knifewithnoname]

"I do be thanking you, priest Koumyou." She took the mug with a nod of her head and blew on it before sipping it, she had no desire to scald her tongue.

It would have been better with honey but she has gotten used to things being not as sweet as she was used to.

"It do be tasting good."

[its_dad_sanzo]

"Koumyou Sanzo," the priest corrected gently, "or just Sanzo. Sanzo's my title, and Koumyou is my homyo, or holy name."

Priest Koumyou Sanzo, or priest Sanzo, would have also been fine and normal, but he couldn't let someone just use his name so informally. Not while there was still a sutra in his charge.

Koumyou tried a cautious sip of his tea, too. "Hmm... it's not bad I guess! I just brought the bags because they're so compact and light. And if any of them get damp I don't have to immediately use or toss the whole thing."

[knifewithnoname]

She blushed, looking down as he corrected her. Names are stupid. She had thought Sanzo was his other name, family name, whatever the name was called that some people had after their first name. Not a title. Did it mean priest? "I do be being sorry Sanzo." She bowed her head.

But he didn't seem too mad, so that was good. And she would be sure to get it right from now on.

"I did no never be having tea in bags before I did be being on the train, but it do no be tasting too weird."

[its_dad_sanzo]

Not mad at all, really, smiling his usual squinty smile and taking another small sip of his hot tea. "Well, not too weird is a good start at least! I didn't see the things I'd need to make proper tea... plus it's just not as portable, that way."

And he'd planned to camp out on his own from the outset, thus everything he brought had to fit in that backpack. Which was why there was no tent, either, but he'd fashioned his lean-to quite expertly out of the local vines and leaves and rocks, lashed to a pair of sturdy trees on the high end and weighed down by more rocks on the low end.

[knifewithnoname]

It was true, tea could be difficult to transport.

She looked around his small camp in interest, he didn't have a tent but had made his own. She wouldn't have the first idea how to do something like that.

"Did you no be wanting to be camping with everyone else, Sanzo>"

[its_dad_sanzo]

"Well... I can cover more ground this way, can't I?" Koumyou blew on his tea to try to cool it down a little faster. "And I admit, I'm not used to being around so many people at all hours, anymore. Not since I was a student!"

[knifewithnoname]

She supposed, it was quicker on your own than with others and he was a priest so he would be perfectly capable of getting around the jungle and surviving on his own, even if he didn't had a Warrior, if those even existed in his world.

"In my world priests do be learning in a temple in the mountains, all together so it do be being really big, did it be being the same where you did be being a student?"

[its_dad_sanzo]

"That sounds right, actually. Cold snowy mountains, and eleven of us crammed into one unit for everything. More than eleven, before the avalanche test."

Probably didn't need elaborating, why their numbers had dropped after an 'avalanche test'.

"Though my training was for the Sanzo rank, which was a lot more hard-core than just becoming a regular priest. There's only ever a maximum of five of us at a time in the world! Four, for most of my tenure -- I did double duty."

[knifewithnoname]

Cold snowy mountains, already that sounded terrible. She had never seen snow until she had been brought on this train adventure and she was not a fan, not at all.

She knows what an avalanche is, a harsh test indeed and she's not surprised their numbers dropped. She wrinkled her nose, there were no good ways to die but if she had to chose, an avalanche would be at the bottom of her list.

"Only five? It must be being a very important job."

[its_dad_sanzo]

"Well, we're each tasked with protecting something very important," Koumyou took a sip of his tea, finding it finally cool enough to take a proper drink. So he did so for a moment, draining half his cup, and then moved to top it off with more hot water from the small cooking pot. It had plenty for several refills for each of them, if needed.

And as he did so, he quoted from memory, his cadence even and steady like he was reciting a mantra, "'Long ago, Shakyamuni Tathagata spread forth a sutra across the heavens, from which was born existence and void, light and dark. The earth was created thence, where life and death came to be. Shakyamuni tore apart the sutra into five pieces and entrusted its fate into the hands of the people Below.'"

[knifewithnoname]

She sipped her tea slowly, listening to him speak without interrupting. Tasked with protecting something important.

Sutra... It's not a word she knows at all but the story tells her what she needs to know. A part of the power of the gods themselves.

He was far more than an ordinary priest, she watched him with wide eyes over her mug.

"So you do be protecting one of the pieces, Sanzo?"

She feels even worse about not talking to him polite enough now, but he hadn't go mad so she was just being careful from now on.

[its_dad_sanzo]

"This is the Seiten sutra," Koumyou touched the edge of the paper over his shoulders meaningfully. His 'thing from home', indeed, sitting on him as it usually did, looking very much like regular paper covered in inscrutable writing. "I used to protect the Maten, too, but it has a new Sanzo now."

None of this was any kind of a secret; he'd been pretty open with anyone that it had come up with. If any of the other passengers ever decided to try to take the sutra from him, they'd learn a lot more than they'd bargained for.

[knifewithnoname]

Her eyes went so wide, she had seen it before of course. It had been in his bag and he wore it all the time, she had wondered why he had worn paper over his shoulder but she hadn't even began to guess that it was part of the power of the gods of his world.

"It do be being a good thing it did be coming here with you." Or was it? Taking a part of his gods power from his world might be bad, but leaving it without a protector sounded bad as well.

Actually the fact the train could even take such a person, so close to his gods, away from his world was terrifying and she doesn't want to think about that right now, she took another sip of tea.

[its_dad_sanzo]

He really did wear it all the time. The only daily exception seemed to be when he slept, and even then it stayed close, the tightly-rolled scroll form it took when removed from his shoulders always either in a pocket of his pajamas, or tucked under his pillow.

"I suppose if it had stayed behind, it would be my heir's responsibility now," Koumyou said thoughtfully, "like the Maten. But I think that after all this time... I would be a bit lost without the responsibility on my shoulders."

That last bit wasn't even a joke, he meant it extremely literally.

"I suppose a Sanzo needs their sutra as much as the sutra needs a protector. One does tend to become something of an extension of the other."

There was no retiring from his position. Apparently, even dying didn't always do it!

[knifewithnoname]

"Will your world be being okay though?" She tilted his head at him, cautious, aware that this was a hard question to ask.

"If a part of your gods power do no be being there any more?"

Because that sounded pretty bad, honestly.

[its_dad_sanzo]

"If anything, it might be better this way," Koumyou said after a moment of thought. "Our duty is to keep them safe, and try to keep them at least somewhat spread apart. I can't see it getting much more apart from the other four pieces, here!"

Unless a whole bunch of other Sanzos showed up. Wouldn't that be awkward? Although Koumyou knew -- from the experience of personally guarding two sutras -- that they were only really dangerous together if fired off simultaneously.

Two going off at once, and reality got... wobbly. More than that, and things could easily start coming undone. All five, and you had on your hands a hard reset of all existence and nonexistence, void and light, life and death.

[knifewithnoname]

"Why do they be needing to be being spread apart, Sanzo?"

That sounded strange, if they were all parts of the power of the gods. Surely they would be better together?

Other worlds are strange but interesting and she hopes he doesn't mind questions.

[its_dad_sanzo]

"Well, to put it simply, if more than one gets used at a time anywhere near each other, reality gets weird. It would scale up from there -- all five would undoubtedly rewrite existence and nonexistence anew, life and death, light and dark."

No one wants to be rewritten, surely?

"It's safe as long as they're not woken up together. I used to guard two myself, after all. But it's riskier the more of them are close to each other."

[knifewithnoname]

"Oh." That was bad. But she supposed, items that were part of the power of the gods, they would have dramatic consequences if used wrong. Otherwise anyone could protect them and not special priests.

"Then it do be being good there do only be being one here."

Even if he was used to being careful. They already face stupid odds often, no one would want existence to be rewritten on top of all of that.

[its_dad_sanzo]

"Right!" Koumyou agreed cheerfully, giving the sutra on one of his bony shoulders a pat, if just for comedic effect.

"So, what sort of trouble have you found out there in the jungle so far? Anything exciting?"

[knifewithnoname]

"Robots. They do be being stupid but they do no be being too difficult to be smashing."

She shrugged, "And pandas, we do no be smashing them but they do be being stupid too."

[its_dad_sanzo]

"Well, it's good that you're not smashing the pandas, they're so cute."

Don't hurt the cute things, Buttercup!

"How are you smashing the robots? I've been using my hands, and chi."