What their Eyes See: Finale

[voidtreckermods]

It’s been a weird mission. The Voidtreckers have been busy investigating, making headway in mapping and saving citizens from the video games and strange illusionary creatures. Those in the fourth tier have made contacts, followed leads and gotten close to the high and mighty of the criminal underworld.

Yet what exactly is happening here is still unknown. Their new found ally Anan is as stumped as the rest of them, but even so, the hackers and technological knowledgeable voidtreckers have been successful in isolating the virus to study and make an anti-virus. A netpoint network has been set up across the city, and enough access data stolen that they can start throwing everything into the systems and networks across the city.

While the illusions remain a mystery and how they got there, finally the world is purged of the strange virus as the anomalies begin to clear up by noon of day ten. Spectura victims wake up in hospital beds, dazed and confused, while no more sightings of the impossible plague those on the other tiers.


On the morning of day eleven, the once housebound and terrified citizens leave their shelters with the first tendrils of light reaching through the fog surrounding the enclosed city. An exodus of people, from fighters of tier four to elites of tier one, are making their way into the streets...and heading down into lifts and outside, out into the smog-filled wasteland.

“It’s so beautiful,” is heard, a rumbling through the crowd as people smile, laugh or wave into the fog.

”I won.” Fighters from tier four look around in wonderment. Other exclamations, about a blue sky, a greeting to a friend fill the air.

There is a pull. The voidtreckers will feel it too, though to them the world looks and feels no different. This pull is easy to resist, or they can follow and investigate it, attempt to lead citizens back inside the city. It’s not safe in the smog, no one has canisters, but none will heed the warnings.

Nor is there time for better efforts when a crackling sounds in the air, light and colours flashing in the smog, everywhere at once and too quick to get a hold on.

“STOP THWARTING ME!” booms out, and a great force pushes them back while pulling the citizens farther into the wasteland, sand and dirt kicked up in a frenzied storm. The voidtreckers can hear the civilians in the smog, but getting to them will prove harder than they may like.

Grabbing an air canister is highly recommended for those who prefer life.



CIRCLE ONE: THE MAZE
No matter where one leaves the city from, they will find themselves in a maze of walls, of metal sheets, each blending into each other. It feels surreal, as if nothing is quite real, nothing quite solid.

But it is solid. For those voidtreckers who cannot see illusions it will look like they are merely stood in the wasteland of the world. But when they begin to move they will learn those walls are tangible, and those that look close enough will see the same almost-light as the creatures that purple team have been fighting as the source.

For those who are not immune to illusions it is a strange place indeed. No smog to be seen, just high unyielding barriers. The pathways are different colours giving off hues of brightest pink, red, purple, neon green, glowing white, darkest black. Sometimes there are symbols on the walls, Capsule Corp, royal insignia, ravager flames, HYDRA, marks of royalty. They are emblazoned on the walls, the floor, sometimes even in the sky. And the deeper in they get...

➤ WINDING ROADS
It's noisy as they move around. As well as the distant noise of the citizens in the distance they can hear an acoustic guitar, erratic piano playing, the sound of bamboo on stone. Or perhaps an eagles cry, a lullaby or a song is heard as they move their way through the maze.

Objects stand in their way, blocking paths and needing to be moved or destroyed. Larger than life playing cards, red apples, flowers. Spears and daggers hang in the air as does the moon and the sun. Water often cascades through routes, making it difficult to move through or fire creeps up walls, nonthreatening but ever present. There are clouds of butterflies and ravens perched on walls, watching their every move, and the smell of sugar often hangs in the air.

But it’s better to navigate these turbulent passages with perseverance than violence. Daggers and apples will shatter and slice apart to attacks, creating a way through to begin with - but those that try the method of destruction to solve their problems will find these walls crowding them tighter, rising higher, becoming all the harder to destroy than they were before. They will become trapped, and will need assistance from the outside to untangle them from webs or jails made from crystal.
➤ STALKING THE STREETS
It isn’t just the Voidtreckers or locals who wander the maze. Wolves, dogs, zombie sheep and ghost animals mostly mind their own business, sometimes inclined to growl or bahh, but easy to pass. But other times, you may sense that you’re being followed, a presence hovering over you...while another companion will see as well the large shadow shrouding you before a decaying hand grabs at you from above, threatening to send its victim to some other part of the maze if not stopped.

Monsters also stalk these paths from various realities. The dead will be met in robes of white while others in armours from medieval times. All are fast, unrelenting in their attacks, unconcerned with pain or stopping without being properly slain. Ghouls of all shapes and sizes search for prey, and many more seek victims.

How they act and how to defeat them may be known to some, but not all. Is it worth the effort to stay and fight illusions, however? Sometimes those illusions don’t give a choice, but in other instances, a person from the city may be found on the ground unconscious, the smog air getting to them. They’ll need help, and fast.

CIRCLE TWO: IS THIS HOME?
Voidtreckers will realise they’ve left the maze when they find themselves in an open field. It spreads out far with vineyards in the distance, a campsite, all of this leading into a forest of childrens board games. While the campsite is not a true campsite as many will realise, it is the first moment everyone will have to come together, to perhaps plan ahead. Air canisters are essential in this environment, and locals have been found needing, unconscious. Backtracking through the maze is a death wish for many, but with the talents of the voidtreckers, setting up a checkpoint here may not be that impossible before going on ahead.

And then, when they finally do…

➤ FAMILIAR
It is almost dream-like as they walk, areas changing without them fully crossing the distance needed. One moment they are in a shopping malls food court, the next the interior of a spaceship; streets of palaces, temples, and mansions line up as a mish-mash of glamour, while others offer more humble abodes, taverns, family homes, bakeries. Medieval structures blend into tech bases, maintenance bays and dark rooms. Beautiful gardens, beaches and dusty souks all share space. But as they move through it, they will be tempted towards what is theirs.

And these can be anything. Ships, palaces, home, and even singular rooms: all of these are seen, doors providing access, doors that draw your character towards it, as if they know what’s on the other side. Spaces personal to the viewer, and with the constant pressure of these illusions, somehow draining to be around, they will find it harder to doubt what they see. Even if their bedroom leads towards a volcano, a blacksmith housing hospital beds right beside it, it will not seem so bizarre to find these natural.
➤ DEARLY BELOVEDS
But it’s not only structures that exist in this labyrinth of streets: there are people, animals - family, friends and pets. Beloved mentors, a smiling loved one. The night sky will wash over, the ocean within view; your favourite plush rabbit, a worn jumper. Your favourite song playing, losing you inside this new reality.

Even people from the Voidtrecker Express are around, whether or not they’re still passengers. Feanor, Zetta, Noctis, Cassie Cage, Jin Ling; Elfnein, Link, Mami, Gyousou, Duo; Senku, Jiang Yanli, Olivia, Bucky Barnes. They walk this plane, friends and lovers of the voidtreckers, coaxing them further into the illusions. Assuring them everything is alright, offering reasons to give in.

Over all this though, they can still hear the citizens in the distance; their voices sounding more confused, frightened even. To push on the voidtreckers must walk away, ignore these temptations and push on to the third ring.

CIRCLE THREE: TWISTED HEART
For those who manage to get through the second circle, pushing away the temptations of home, they will find themselves back in the smog filled wasteland. But through the smog they will see more, always more. Once again the scenery blurs into impossibilities, from testing labs with padded beds, to other imagery associated with asylums of old, to dark cramped spaces, to hallways raging on fire. They sense fear itself, and even the most stoic will find apprehension digging into them as they make their way forward. Is this their fear? Or is it your own?

It may be hard to discern in this twisted reality.

➤ MISERY LOVES COMPANY
This time, as the scenery shifts around them, so does their own sense of self try to match what these places mean. The despair of being lost in darkness, the belief that they can’t be seen by others, all sound fading from their ears. They are on the moon, trapped there for years; at the edge of the vast ocean, on the bank of a river of lava, despair in their hearts. In a wrecked city, their own city destroyed almost beyond recognition. By opposing forces, by weapons of mass destruction.

They have lost everything. There’s no fixing this.

A Pandora box of fears have been unleashed, with seemingly no hope. Your worst enemy has been granted a second chance, family stumbling towards you on the verge of death before your eyes; forces that you were meant to be dealing with back home have found you, surely leaving your own world in ruins, from titans to ayakashis.

Or they might stumble upon a graveyard, stretched out as far as they can see where every name is someone they care about.

There are even voidtreckers of now and old opposing you: Danny Fenton, Lan Xichen, Darth Vader, Vegeta, Xue Yang. Kerry stands pointing a gun straight at a fellow passenger while shadowy ravens and terrifying dragons swirl in the sky.

All this emotional turmoil will do a number on the voidtreckers, but there is strength in numbers. More civilians have fallen unconscious at this point, and those willing to aid them can take them back to the city. But no matter how the voidtreckers move, they must keep their nerve and hold onto hope as they cross the final hurdles.

Comments

whoops, there he is

[oncedriven]

They're not too close, at the moment - no need to be glued to each other's sides, after all - but the minute Asch feels the way the emotional bleed goes still in frost-coated terror, he's regretting that.

The fact that they're distant from each other is the only reason Citan gets long enough to say those words, really.

It's hard to parse exactly what feelings Asch slams into the emotional bleed beyond the general message, I'mcomingrighttheFUCKnow, but that should be enough, he hopes. It's still a long moment before his footsteps come out of the smog, just in time to hear-

How many times would this be, now?

And he knew it. He knew it, not in any way that Jade so directly said it. To hear it so directly still feels like a punch in the chest, something that would make him crumble if he wasn't already moving forward. If it weren't for the fact that there's still enough instinctive loyalty to a driver in his bones that -

Seven, is the word he swallows, instead, sliding to a stop between Jade and the monster that most people would have called human. In contrast to the calm displayed by Citan and the way Jade is frozen, Asch is all motion, his hair failing to entirely come to a stop with the rest of him. It remains blown by an etherial wind, some small amount of Asch's attention still on keeping the worst of the smog at bay.

"So that's what the bastard looks like," he says, and whether it's to Jade or Citan or himself is anyone's guess. But his temper is blazing, brave and dark and deep, and everything about him is set. "He won't get past me."

[crimsonsnow]

Jade's attention flickers over to Asch, who only isn't blocking his view of the bastard who he killed--killed him again and again and-- is because Asch is shorter than Jade, which. That's fine. Jade wouldn't want to take his eyes off his old driver, anyway.

The emotion bleed responds with confusion-gratefulness-maybe-I'm-not-worth-it, but perhaps the less is said about the emotion bleed and the overwhelming apathy that Jade thinks he's feeling right now, the better. He sends a confused prod Asch's direction, feeling the taste of Asch's anger, of justice that isn't blinding white, just to feel something solid.

Jade may still be frozen, but his fears aren't.

"I won't, will I?" Citan laughs, dismissive as always, unbothered. In a fluid movement Jade's spear snaps into his hand - which shouldn't be possible, seeing as Jade is still holding his spear, but it's an illusion, so fuck possible. "I'd really, truly, love to see you stop me."

With grace that could outmatch Jade's, he lunges for Asch.

[oncedriven]

Asch doesn't have Mythra's Foresight. He can't see exactly what will happen, pick up out of all the possibilities the where and when and how things will happen.

But he is still a precognitive blade. He knew this would come to a fight, one way or another, and so Citan's impossible spear strikes, with a loud clang, a greatsword that appears in front of Asch in a burst of dark ether, point down and hilt-up, for a moment hanging in the air like the most powerful of blade weapons do before he settles his hand around the hilt.

(He could have used another weapon. The sword he put through Van's back wasn't this one, but the smaller, lighter blade that comes to him in flames - his brother's sword.)

(But this isn't about Luke. It's about justice. And justice always comes to him, naturally, in the dark.)

(And it's about Jade.)

In the same way that Citan's voice is detached, cold, uninterested, Asch's voice is alive with feeling. It is angry and disdainful and so, so unafraid.

"That's my line."

And he lifts the sword from where it hangs tip in the dirt and swings, wide across where Citan's waist will be if the bastard doesn't get out of the way, and he pulls. Ice ether trails after the dark edge of the greatsword, leaving scatterings of quickly-vanishing snowflakes on the air.

"Because even the memory of you is going to die today."

Whether it's his hands or Jade's on the weapon, it doesn't matter. The certainty that echoes through the emotional bleed makes his words into nothing less than prophecy.

[crimsonsnow]

Asch is not Mythra, but in this moment Asch still manages to be plenty loud, which is what Jade needs to unhook the phantom apathy in his core. He's not used to burning, he's not used to darkness that's full instead of being something's lack. But cradled by Asch's certainty, he leans into it, the truth of it, and pours Asch as much ether as he wants, as much ether as he needs--

Wait a minute. If the trick worked the first time, why not the second? Citan surely can't fight two fronts at once, and Jade doesn't even need to be close. Ice shoots up to freeze his very dead driver's feet in place so the phantom of him can't move before Asch's sword strikes true.

(The thing about illusions is they only have power over you if you let them.)

Jade watches Citan die a second time - and if the satisfaction that slides up his throat is a beast of a thing, well. He's always been more in tune with justice than other truth blades.

"One more and we'd be even," Jade says, even though he knows Citan killed him likely more than three times, even though what he should really be saying is thanks. Ice crystals still flutter around him, his body still tense for a fight, but he breathes, relieved.

[oncedriven]

It's certainly effective. The way his blade cuts through the illusion feels like it should be real enough, until the end when the illusion disappears.

Asch's not even breathing particularly hard as he lets the blade dissolve into shadows, turning back towards Jade. There's a prod in the emotional bleed as he says, "Feeling better? Because if we stick around here long enough, you can probably kill him again."

The way the place feeds on fears keeps setting his intuition off in a way that makes the hair on the back of his neck rise. Waiting mode is the worst, when you're a precognitive, and it keeps him from entirely relaxing.

[crimsonsnow]

The emotion bleed is still shaky, but not frozen. So, yes, better, even if not at an ideal.

He barks a laugh, mostly startled, at Asch's suggestion. "Perhaps we shouldn't stick around long enough for that." It wouldn't be fair to Mythra, he thinks first, which - isn't necessarily the best thought to think, and the pang of the missing in the emotion bleed is all edges. "Not that I don't think we couldn't handle it, but there's no need to invite it, either."

His hand remains on his spear, old habits clinging to him like the past. With his free hand, though, he readjusts his glasses. "I suppose... I suppose you know, now, then. The reason you and I tend to get along so well."

Which is vague, but, even after all this time, what blade would be used to having a conversation about their driver having killed them at least three times over?

[oncedriven]

Asch takes a deep breath, and says, "I kind suspected already. That's... Just the way my life works."

And Jade knows about his intuition, now. It's probably enough to put two and two together. Asch stares at the place where 'Citan' fell.

"If I were you," he says at some length, "I'd have been terrified of seeing him again, even outside of bullshit like this. Even if there's only one human we can confirm as coming back..."

They haven't addressed that, either. But Asch doesn't doubt that Jade knows exactly who he means, doesn't think Jade will be surprised that Asch too has met her, lifetimes and lifetimes ago.

"Ever since the Luke here mentioned him, I've been terrified that his world's Van would show up. But at least blades aren't being reborn in the same way that humans are born every single day."

[crimsonsnow]

Intuition noted - Jade had had a feeling there, himself - but not commented on, because the first words out of Jade's mouth are: "Architect, if he ends up on this train I don't know what I'll--" Murder, probably. If the train will let him get away with it.

(Is this about Van? Citan? ...Yes.)

Jade sighs. Focuses. "I'll admit... I had somewhat planned for the off, off chance that Anna wasn't the only one who, well." He shares a meaningful look with Asch, mentally noting that as something else Asch knows, somehow. Intuition, probably. Or... if Anna really has been doing that since the world began. Anyway. "But those plans involved Mythra. And they certainly didn't involve him remembering me - why would he? Anna never has, not for more than an offhand comment."

He reaches up - the motion looks as if it could pass for tucking loose hair behind his ear, but Jade's fingers linger on the loose braid he has tucked there for several seconds longer than that.

"I'll be better prepared next time, I suppose." That's all he can do. "...for Van, as well."

[oncedriven]

"She doesn't remember me, either, aside from looking at me like I've walked over her grave a few times." Which is pretty damn close to accurate, considering the circumstances of their meeting. But that's not the point and honestly is something they can talk about later.

"But I think we both know that memory's a lot more fickle than that between lifetimes," he says. It's said looking at his hands, more than at Jade. "Ever since I found out that that Luke is friends with his world's version of you..."

It makes a lot of sense, and gives him something about what happened in that long thousand years. The pairs of Aegisite blades were each once a single blade, after all - being connected in ways beyond even normal sibling blades wouldn't be that surprising.

He sighs. "Death's no more permanent on the train than it is for blades," he says. "For blades now." Meaning, their memories will be intact. "I can't say that throwing either of them into the tracks wouldn't be appealing, but for my sanity, I avoid thinking about it."

[crimsonsnow]

Alright, that confirms Asch met Anna, and it's not an intuition thing. Jade considers asking what circumstances, but no, now isn't really the time. He'll probably ask later, though, curious to a fault.

"It is strange to consider, I'll admit," Jade agrees. "Luke is all but stranger to me - to think we're friends, in another world... I can wrap my head around it, but it doesn't feel real." He looks to Asch, trying to decide if he can figure out what's Asch's mind - but Jade can't read Asch at a glance like he can read Mythra.

(But then, a memory. Asch's own voice - There's no reason for it to feel like losing an old friend. - Jade sits on that thought and considers it, but doesn't do anything with it for now. Better to let Asch come there on his own, decide to discuss it on his own. Jade knows so little about Aegisites, anyway.)

"Well I suppose it's good to hear if I die it won't be permanent," Jade says, though he tables actually processing what that means for him for another time. "But that is unfortunate, for... other cases." He wishes he, like Asch, could simply avoid thinking about it. He's going to have to think about it at least long enough to come up with a plan - like hell is he getting stuck again.

Speaking of getting stuck. "Do you suppose we should get moving, again? I think I'm up for it." No point waiting for himself to regulate completely; who knows what else this place is going to throw at them before they're done.

[oncedriven]

"He's my own brother and practically a stranger to me," Asch points out. "This one and the one in our world."

That's the lot of blades, in some ways. Asch is lucky to even know that he has a sibling before running into them. (It makes him think of Tear, and how appalled she must have been with what Van was doing, to have stood back and let Asch destroy her brother, knowing that would be the end of him. That she'd never have a brother again, not in any lifetime.)

(If Tear hated him, Asch wouldn't judge her for it.)

"No point in staying around here waiting for something else to catch up with us," he what he says aloud. "Maybe stick together from here out, though." And not just because with a bit of effort he can get rid of the worst of the smog, a trick he's had to develop pretty quickly out here.

[crimsonsnow]

When Asch puts it like that, Jade has the sharp feeling of ah, foot: meet mouth. He refrains from saying anything more. He knows what blade siblings are like.

"Oh I wouldn't dream of leaving you in a place like this, not at this point," Jade says - the emotion bleed a bit raw with just how much he really doesn't want either of them to be alone right now.

Anyway, Asch is the precognitive blade here, so: "Any idea which direction would be best?" Even with Asch clearing the worst of the smog - which Jade appreciates, really - there's still no real landmarks out here, no real sign of anything; the wasteland itself perhaps part of the illusion, though it's certainly not Jade's fear. Either way, no sense wasting time chasing shadows when you don't have to.

slaps this in mostly bc it's half done

[oncedriven]

The rawness in the emotional bleed is met with something acknowledging but not quite reassuring. Asch is in fact the precognitive blade in this scenario, and his intuition is not happy with this.

"I don't like any of these directions," Asch says, giving the smog a displeased look. It's true enough; the whole place has a feeling of nothing but trouble. "But if we're going to keep going further out, it's this way." He turns away from where the city is at this point practically invisible in the distance and starts to walk, trying to ignore the feeling of looming.