The Endless River

[voidtreckermods]

On the morning of day twenty one of the month of Kazoo there is a message on the ICP screens around the train. Their SCA's will light up the colour of the Void and show the following information.

World #398050 is a void nexus known locally as Tshering. As a void nexus this world has strong links with the void and the connection through worlds. World #398050 is home to the Endless River. Legends speak of this river being powerful enough to send thoughts from one heart to another across any distance. All that is needed is for you to know who it is you wish to reach.

On-board

The dressing carriage is open, filled with clothing best suited to a pleasant spring day. Light, airy and in a rainbow of joyful colours and florals. One closet is entirely filled with wide-brimmed hats bedecked with ribbons, feathers and ornaments. A stack of picnic baskets and containers filled with an alarming variety of passenger-suitable foodstuffs and flasked drinks sits in one corner, next to rolls of thick, weatherproof blankets in the four team colours.

The large box marked Do Not Use Yet, filled with small, empty jute bags, is hopefully still sat in the Luggage carriage, ready for passengers to grab handfuls of its contents as directed by the announcement.

Upon landing (after an appropriate countdown), the train remains on the surface, its carriages partially curved to form a gathering site for the day. Welcome to Tshering, the eighth void nexus!



A Day for Picnics

Tshering, system #398050, is a strange place, only habitable by grace of the passengers' SCAs. The sky is shot through with colours, a cascade of sunsets, and through it, the void shimmering through it in seams like a child's painting of the milky way. Still, there's a beauty to the chaotic mash of colours that soaks through its landscape, and in the shelter of the forests of towering funghi that dot its surface, the Void can go unseen by its visitors.

The temperature seems mild, suitable for the provided clothing, and if there are weather patterns around the world they've taken the day off. The funghi are sturdy enough that what air flow there is doesn't disturb their stalks, and carved grooves and holds in some of the larger examples indicate that climbing them to sit atop their glowing crowns is eminently possible, and, in fact, encouraged.

the Endless River

The Endless River is a font of pure chaos, flowing from a multitude of small rivulets across the area to a central reservoir, from which it pours directly upwards, away from Tshering's surface and out of sight, beyond the world's atmosphere.

Anything bagged and placed within the Endless River will also flow upwards and soon be out of sight, passing, presumably, into the Void. Scattered across the surface of Tshering are small, glittering pebbles, as described in the announcement.

The stones are pleasantly cool to the touch, and all passengers need to do is feel. Messages can be in any form that the Voidtreckers wish. Perhaps words, perhaps feelings, perhaps an image from their mind into the stone. Perhaps a mixture. Once they begin their message the stone will glow slightly and continue to glow as they secure it in the bag and cast it into the river. They will feel, almost instinctively, that they need to focus as they do so, thinking of the person they wish to reach all the while.

There are plenty of bags and many more stones; passengers will not be limited in their sendings.

Comments

[light_of_willpower]

"I couldn't send one either. I think if I did--all it would be--would be a burning rage and desire to end the androids emotion. No words." Trunks said, with sympathy and no judgment.

[subcircuits]

"Honestly, if anyone deserves to get a little psychic hatebomb through the interdimensional rivermail, I think it'd be them," Devero opines with a shrug.

[light_of_willpower]

Trunks shrugged in turn. "Some would think I'm a coward for not sending it. Some would think I'm a coward if I did, instead of confronting them face to face." Trunks said thoughtfully. "But only I get to judge whether I am or not."

Do you see the point he's making here Devero?

[subcircuits]

Devero huffs through his nose, the exhalation scattering smoke away from his face in little curls. Oh, he sees the point-- and he has already judged himself wanting.

"Doubt the train brought us here to be angry at people anyway," he mutters evasively. "Got the impression it was trying to do something nice for us."

[light_of_willpower]

"Maybe." Trunks shrugged. "For all the train is more advanced than us, it isn't like us. It doesn't fully understand what we need or want, and has limited means to communicate with us. So maybe it was trying to do something nice. Maybe it was trying to do something kind though. Give us a place we can rest, maybe grieve a bit."

Reaching up and raking his hand through his bangs. "I know I grieved a bit--but probably not for what most people expected. I brooded off and on all day, really."

[subcircuits]

Devero takes his joint delicately between his fingertips and holds it up between the two of them. "This is what I did all day," he says with a bitter laugh. This is what he's been doing with increasing frequency in the days since the last platform.

He stares down at it, in that moment seeing the drug for what it is: an evasion. He licks fingertip and thumb and puts the joint out, stashing the remaining stub in a pocket.

He wants to ask Trunks if he wants to talk about it, but he doesn't want to be a hypocrite. He stares out at the river, awkward (and a little addled). Finally he breaks the silence, but only to say, "Train's doing its best by us, isn't it?"

[light_of_willpower]

If he was hoping for judgment from Trunks, he wasn't going to get any. "You're a break. So why shouldn't you spend it how you want?" He said reasonably, folding his arms over his chest. "You're not hurting anyone else, and I'm pretty sure you're only hurting yourself--which I don't like, but I'm not your mom."

He was his brother.

"I think the train is trying, in it's own way. It knows that last mission was rough on us all."

[subcircuits]

Hurting himself? "I'm not!" Devero objects automatically, looking almost wounded by the assertion. "It's just herb, I'm not even drinking or anything!" Not much, anyway. Just a shot of vodka here or there to take the edge off.

More of the edge off than the he can manage with the weed by itself.

...Yeah, he's hurting himself.

He jams his hands in his pockets and hunches in on himself. He's very tempted to relight the joint that he just put out, but manages to resist for the moment. "It was a fucking nightmare by the end," he mutters, his voice thick.

[light_of_willpower]

Trunks is just going to raise an eyebrow at the vehemence of Dev's reply, but....he's willing to let it drop. For now. Instead he listens to what Dev says next. "Would you like to talk about it? Or for me to just keep you silent company?"

[subcircuits]

He's silent for a long time, long enough that it might seem like he's not going to respond at all. But finally, finally... he speaks. For possibly the first time since the mission, he lets himself put it to words.

"I got-- my mind-- taken over," he says hesitantly. "I had no idea anything was e-even wrong. Trunks..." He looks over at him, and his voice is full of anguish and shame. "I tried to kill Koumyou!"

[light_of_willpower]

"I'm sorry." Trunks says, after a moment. "But it wasn't your fault. I was dealing with Nozomi, who had the same thing happen."

[subcircuits]

"Why us?" Devero asks, shooting it back immediately. "What was it about the two of us that made us susceptible, when no one else on the battlefield was afflicted?"

This has been on his mind a lot.

[light_of_willpower]

"I don't have an answer." Trunks said, after thinking for a moment. "But I still believe it wasn't your fault. I don't think Koumyou does either."