voidtreckermods: (train)
VoidTrecker Express Mods ([personal profile] voidtreckermods) wrote in [community profile] middleofsomewhere2021-04-10 06:25 am

The Endless River

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.
fightcreamsundae: (033)

[personal profile] fightcreamsundae 2021-05-02 02:25 am (UTC)(link)
"Okay, as long as you at least think about it."

She didn't want to push it any further. This was an emotional day for a lot of people and she didn't want to upset him.

She was quiet with the hug, but she eventually pulled away and sat back. She fidgeted a little to adjust her dress, make sure everything was still appropriate and whatnot. She grew still and looked back up to Yondu after she finished.

"A lot of people around here are so worried about being tough or whatever, I dunno. I feel like even if I offer a lot of them wouldn't take me up on it."

Her expression shifted into something that was gently exasperated. She looked like an older sister who was having to deal with a difficult sibling and was resigned to dealing with whatever antics was going on now.

"A lot of people here are so unwilling to talk about things and be vulnerable. People cling to their hurts like they're special treasures here." Her expression softened. "It's hard though, I know. But it makes me sad to see everyone carrying all that weight around with them."
yondu: (1 6 7)

[personal profile] yondu 2021-05-02 06:00 am (UTC)(link)
"That ain't it... not exactly. Most of us don't like talkin' about it 'cause... I dunno, I always described it as showin' your underbelly. These things, they take a long time to scab over an' form scars. An' I've reached out to people a couple o' times. Got rebuffed. Got told shit like I was bein' soft. Got told hurtin' was nothin' special..."

He works his mouth as he thinks about that.

"They ain't treasures, they're shards of glass people can kick into your middle way too easy. An' Sugar I'm real full of glass. Most of us ain't all that different. An' you can swear up an' down you won't make it worse, but none of us know that.

"You're also young. I know you got good intentions. But if anybody's worth their salt they ain't gonna heap their problems on you. I never even told my boy most of what I went through. It was nothin' for him to carry."
fightcreamsundae: (037)

[personal profile] fightcreamsundae 2021-05-05 12:09 pm (UTC)(link)
She listens to him attentively, her head tilting to the side slightly as Yondu explains that it's like shards of glass. There's a settling of her expression that signified the shift in her perception, an understanding that she had been missing.

"I think everyone has challenges in their lives, but just because everyone has challenges doesn't mean that it doesn't hurt and, um, I'm sorry that people or someone in your past did their best to minimize how you felt. They shouldn't have done that."

She's sort of working through this as she's speaking about it. This was clearly something that was very opposed to her own experience that she was trying to figure out how to word what she wanted to say. Her next words sounded like a conversation she'd had before, though definitely in a different context.

"Everyone should be responsible for their own actions because the only thing we can control in these worlds are ourselves." A thoughtful pause. "But if someone offers you a hand or a shoulder to lean on... Then why not take it?" She smiled a little at him. "I'm stronger than I look, you know. I think I could support ya." She put her right fist in her left hand and flexed her right arm at him in a show that she was rather strong. She relaxed and the smile faded into a more serious expression.

"And maybe I'm not the best person to talk to, but sometimes just having someone who listens can be helpful too. And I'm always willing to lend an ear even if I don't know the best thing to say."