Enemy Unknown: Conclusion

[voidtreckermods]

The third night is as long and creepy as the others...

It might be that they found the engine room, solved the puzzles and found themselves in the hangar bay with no way out. It might be that they were still in the station hiding from the invisible monsters. Or it might be that they had been plucked from the mission and were waiting in their holding room.

Either way morning dawns on the fourth day...

---

ENEMY: UNKNOWN

---

DAY FOUR

the trapped. THOSE WHO SOLVED THE ENGINE ROOM SPENT THE NIGHT IN A LARGE HANGAR THAT DOES NOT SEEM TO HAVE ANY DOORS. Their SCA's are working, so they can still communicate with those in the station, perhaps talk them through the engine room puzzles or tell them to stay clear. As morning comes all the lights in the hangar come on. Brighter than any lights so far in the station, harsh white light after the eerie red of the rest of the mission.

Everyone still in the station wakes where they fell asleep - if they slept at all. It's not long after most people are up and about that they will hear a high-pitched beep from their SCA, and then a blue light will envelop them and those around them. It might be they spot their friends vanishing before they too disappear.

They arrive in the hangar, reunited with those who spent the night there. All their gear is with them at least, but that doesn't solve the problem of being in a hangar with no obvious way out. Nor are any of those who vanished during the last three days here, their SCA's still go unanswered.

---

the vanished. FOR THOSE IN THE HOLDING ROOM, THEIR NIGHT HAS PROCEEDED MUCH LIKE THE NIGHTS BEFORE. One of the screens showed the hangar, and those that had succeeded in completing the engine room task. The lights had dimmed for sleeping and turned on again bright in the morning. For those watching the screens they will see those in the station vanish in blue light and turn up in the hangar.

Around half an hour later a voice sounds in the room. "Please gather your belongings and prepare for release."

It's another ten minutes, allowing them to make sure they have all their things before their SCA's beep. They are then surrounded by a blue light, taking them from the room they had spent the last few days in.

REUNITED

reunion. AN HOUR PASSES AFTER FIRST ARRIVALS PASS IN THE HANGAR. Suddenly, there is another flash of blue light, and the missing eighteen Voidtreckers appear with the rest of their crew. They will find they had all their gear as well, including their missing weapons.

They are left to their own devices for a small while, a time for reuniting with friends, but not long enough to exchange stories before a voice rings out in the hangar:

"THANK YOU CREW OF THE VOIDTRECKER EXPRESS FOR YOUR COMPLIANCE. YOU MAY RETURN TO YOUR CRAFT."
There is a loud mass of beeping as everyone's SCA's flashes at the same time, holographic messages popping up too fast to be able to read them in their entirety.

Voidtreckers come in.

All Voidtreckers return to the Voidtrecker Express

Voidtreckers evacuate now

Voidtreckers do you read?

Layers of holographic messages pile on top of each other but a moment later everyone's SCA's glow gold and everyone vanishes from the hangar...

LUGGAGE CARRIAGE

return. EVERYONE ARRIVES INSIDE THE LUGGAGE CARRIAGE, PACKED LIKE SARDINES BETWEEN SUITCASES AND TRUNKS. There is no announcement, no warning of returning to the void; just a lurch that is likely to throw anyone on the train unaware of what has just happened off their feet, no matter the carriage they're in.

They return to the void at what feels like breakneck speed. Colours fly past the windows, and it is a good few hours before they seem to slow to their normal travel speed.

---

Comments

[jingyeets]

The last thing he was expecting, unhappy as he was, happened to be feeling anyone else in the sort of way that had his defenses immediately flaring up, ultimately useless as they were. It took him a moment to pin down the familiarity of that energy, but he was already pushing back at it (again, to no effect) and mentally shouting:

Hey! Elidibus?! What the hell are you doing!?

Anyone seeing Jingyi physically where he stood on train would see him reaching for his head with a frown and lashing his tail, agitated.

[wewillwewill]

Look, sometimes it's better to ask forgiveness than seek permission, right? Though there's a faint flutter of surprise when not only is he detected, his presence is responded to. Communication, now it's been established, isn't too difficult.

-Looking into the encounters with our recent hosts.- There is definitely a feeling of irritation and wryness with the word 'hosts'. -Forgive the intrusion if it's seen as such, I have no interest in aught else other than this 'interview'.-

Meanwhile said experience of the interview is playing. If Jingyi has particular skills other than sending mental thoughts, he might even catch glimpse of the experience which, rather than from his perspective, seems to be an overall view of events, as though watching a scene.

[jingyeets]

Ah, let the complaining begin. He does notice a bit of what was going on, but he's more reflexively focussed on pressing against Elidibus, for what little good it does him.

What if! What do you mean, if?! How is this not an intrusion! You don't ask, you just take, how's that any better than what the hell the train does, or those investigators did!?

While the odd third person narrative take on his interview plays on as a memory, his offense and a thread of visceral fear both lace through his mental voice.

[wewillwewill]

-It's not by much.- 'Take' is a harsh word, since that implies Elidibus doesn't intend to give back.

-My intent is to take back what I can of what our 'hosts' have stolen. Would you be complaining if it were their aether I brushed while gleaning this information or concern for me as to whether they could retaliate?-

Don't worry, he can multitask. Talk to Jingyi, hold a debate and watch the er... footage. Offense he can handle as well. And certainly he has the wherewithal to point out how likely it is the train's passengers would be finding this acceptable behavior if used directly their enemies.

Fear though...

-I do not mean to cause you fear. Have you been victim of such attacks often?-

This last bit is said gently. He isn't trying to force Jingyi to feel better. But he seems sincere about the fear part at least, for all there's no apology for the intrusion.

[jingyeets]

It doesn't address the fear, which had nothing to do with logic, and everything to do with losing half his clan and his parents to people who forced the dead into the living's minds and thus wresting their bodies away from them. Which conceptually is neither here nor there, but the fear Elidibus has brushed against is deep-seated, aware of a wrongness and a danger in what is happening, even as it's for different circumstances.

I don't have to cooperate with our 'hosts!' We're part of the same damn crew, and you do this, how the hell am I supposed to trust you? Does that matter to you at all?

Crux of an issue, because of course, everyone has double standards. Of course everyone is okay when the powers of their allies are aimed outward, and shudder to think of them aimed inward. The Wei Wuxian of his world (and maybe most, he doesn't know) had to face that by suspicion and assumption, which was refuted by those who stood with him, against those who elected to stand opposed.

Jingyi, for his part, also assumes it doesn't matter to Elidibus. As the out-of-body version of events plays past, and his body language in all its distress showcases, he mimics it again in the now, until his tail stills because he backs himself against a wall to still everything.

[wewillwewill]

As intended, Elidibus isn't prying any more deeply than the interview itself and he has the talent to be that precise. That doesn't mean Jingyi can't bleed a bit of extra information over their connection. Most of the time the Ascian does this, it is not accompanied by a telepathic conversation.

-I would ask why it bothers you that I use my talents for our benefit. It's clear you have no reason to trust me nor seem willing to place faith in my actions as a fellow passenger. And it is fair to do so.- He seems weirdly at peace with this. -To answer your question, it matters to me. But the benefits of this choice outweighed my personal comfort. Since it troubles you, if I need to do this in the future, I'll be certain to inform you of my intent.-

What Elidibus can't change is what is already done.

-...Perhaps would be best if we halted this conversation.- That is a lot of emotional bleed. Elidibus is not without some compassion for Jingyi's distress, but he isn't in a position where he can stop it. -Pray find someone close to you for comfort.-

And if Jingyi doesn't, Elidibus will break his silence long enough to reach out to someone and make sure they find and speak with the distressed dragon.

[jingyeets]

Having little practise in separating emotion from words in his own mind, that bleedover was inevitable in its fashion. As is the awareness of a full recounting of what he'd lived through once already, but the words that aren't his, Elidibus's concepts, it's partly what annoyed him and probably had Inigo annoyed by him back on station.

For our benefit.

Inform me. Ask. Just ask people. What the hell is so hard about asking, and then doing this shit?

Not taking, because it is taking without permission, whatever good intent he has down the line to hand information back. Jingyi has always believed that the means to an end matters, has to matter, or else you justify everything away as a necessity in the time where it felt expedient.

Where it was convenient, when life was not built to any one person's convenience.

Jingyi is all too eager to cut conversation, and so he does, like a mental silence that echoes now because it's knowingly quiet. He makes no mental indication of reaching out to anyone. He's just done.