[S72] MENTAL LINK;

[frakkincylons]

LONGING a girl with golden hair, bright eyes and a soul like a star	CHILL lighten up a bit. it's only the end of the world.
FREEDOM fight 'em until we can't	CREATION harmony, connection, life, the universe, beyond human

( CODE BY WHAMBAM )

Comments

DAY 171 passing through on the Castor train

[decommission]

[ A soft disturbance runs along the line connecting the two of you. Not communication, but instead something closer to movement in a single direction. Brief, searching for something outside of his reach and beyond yours too. His single-minded determination to reach beyond the brood to some unseen place is palpable.

The expo is lit in electric blue and the bubbling noise of the excitable crowds. A synthetic man in a tube stares back at him. There's no time to study his face or the placard before someone yanks at his shoulder and a whiff of smoke from a cigarette catches him straight in the face.

He keeps moving. ]

[frakkincylons]

[ it ripples through sam unexpected, as he's sitting in the flight deck, digging through the scrap heap for parts. a bustling crowd, a sharp pull on his shoulder, the waft of cigarette smoke, and a machine that looks like a man.

rebounding from one part of his mind to the next, it resonates, and pings a specific moment in time. panic and energy, people running from one place to the next, shouting commands and answering the same. excitement, but not the thrill of a crowd at a fair. a fortress under attack, and sam in the middle of it, spiraling out of control. looking at the world around him like it's a spotty film projection, unreal. and thrumming above it all, a cloud of fear, and such a fierce, desperate denial, his own voice echoing in his thoughts. not after all this. not after the resistance, and the occupation, and watching my friends die one after another for frakking this?

in the present, sam steps back from the salvage pile, head giving a violent shake, before his fingertips touch at his temples. what the hell? ]

( Steve? What're you doing? )

[decommission]

[ Five sets of memories, emotions and personalities pull at him. What's happened once upon a time and what's happening now is difficult for him to separate as he presses forward, the sound of his name as a question reflected over too many different voices to single out.

He does what he can to pull away from the loudest noises, continuing on the path that leads him through the connective tissue of their brood until he hits a solid wall. There he hovers for some time, straining to push past it. All at once his thread snaps back like a rubber band, returning to his own branch of their tree. ]

after PETRE

[erbier]

( The boy is some kind of monster. )

[ Not just that he's obnoxious, that he truly has something ugly hidden under his human facade. It makes her skin crawl, her utter revulsion spreading, ice in the veins. ]

[frakkincylons]

( 'Demon's what he told me. Why, did he do something do you? )

[ oh hell nah, son. but yeah, little brain-sis, he gets you. there is something seriously wrong with that guy. ]

[erbier]

( There is a demon in our hive. )

[ How can that not bother anyone else? To be of-one with a flesh eating monster with no conscience? It deeply disturbs Ilde. She's seen the wreckage left behind by from a monster's feast. ]

( That thing is tied to Angel. It will poison her. )

[ She's not a fan of Petre, and it goes beyond his shitty attitude. He should be culled. ]

DAY 020 {bearings}

[bracchium]

[Something is coming. Like a hornet's nest, extraspace hums and vibrates with tension; it resonates with strings of memories, setting them buzzing. He spends a chunk of the day rooting through his head for something comforting and quiet and familiar, but the only respite arrives in the form of the weighty steel arm sitting beside him at the desk in his room. Cushions litter the floor, the bed sheets twisted in a marl, and he leaves them to search out a mind he's familiar, but not entirely comfortable with.

Bucky's focus narrows to a pinpoint, slicing through the marl of connected minds to the one he wants.

Sam.

He visualizes his metal arm attached to the remains of his left, wires frayed and singed and burning, but there. His touch isn't gentle against the other mind- his control too clumsy and unpracticed.]

[frakkincylons]

[ Sam's honestly surprised Bucky contacts him at all, especially through mental link. Firstly, given he'd seemed ready to rip his head off the last time they spoke, and secondly, due to how aggressively he was rejecting the mental links of the hive. so, with that in mind, the notion sent back is a short ping of awareness - yes, he heard you - before he's pacing across the commons room of the flat towards bucky's door, to speak with him in person.

leaning in through the doorway, his brows lift, looking from the cushions on the floor, to the mess of bedsheets, to the arm, and finally to bucky himself. hoooow's it going, buddy? ]

Need help with that? [ the arm. he'd gotten the mental picture - the want to have it attached, and the mess of circuitry going on in what's left of his original prosthetic.

he might have said 'need a hand?', but that would be in poor taste. (kara would've said it) ]

[bracchium]

[It's easier than silently stalking across a room full of people who will turn and gawk at the super soldier and the mental link has become more- dare he think it- natural in the week since his return to the Bearings. He hates the link, but the effectiveness cannot be denied. The ping sent back is met with nothing but static, like a phone line left open and off the hook.

He doesn't glance up at Sam when he approaches and instead replies only to the question posed.]

It's temporary. [Something taken on and off, something easily disarmed.]

PREPPING FOR AN ADVENTURE.

[erbier]

from: saffron@extra.net
to: simanderson@extra.net

Come with me.

---- FWD ----
from: xyz@extra.net
to: saffron@extra.net

glad to hear from you. everyone wants to see youre okay. well meet somewhere out of the way, you must be kinda spooked.

[ COORDINATES.KML ]

meet you there tomorrow 20:00, ill show you the way.

ADVENTURE!!!

[frakkincylons]

from: simanderson@extra.net
to: saffron@extra.net

Of course. The same kids from before?

[erbier]

from: saffron@extra.net
to: simanderson@extra.net

They may be there, I am not certain. All the more reason I do not wish to go alone.

There were young fans in the crowd who were injured.

[ Maybe they're upset. Maybe they just want her to kiss their injuries. She doesn't know, man. ]

025

[narcissithstic]

I need to speak with you.

[frakkincylons]

[ oh. ren wants to actually talk about things. how much money should he bet that it has to do with death threats? welp, we'll see. ]

( I'm free. Are you in Bearings? )

[narcissithstic]

I am. [The briefest glimpse of his surroundings paints the distinct image of Hux's apartment. Broad windows, pristine walls— everything you'd expect from the General, really.] General Hux seems determined to keep close watch.

Your influence, I assume.

day 024??? 025? we just don't know

[exhuxperation]

( Sam Anders, do you have a minute? )

[ Because checking with two other sources isn't enough for a busybody like him. Or also he might be a little bored and frustrated looking after a giant child name Kylo Ren. ]

jfkldsa w/e w/e either works yolo

[frakkincylons]

( What can I do for you, General? )

[ he feels you, homie. bless you for taking on this task. ]

[exhuxperation]

( You were at the arena, correct? I'd like to hear what happened from the start of the chaos, if you've the time. I have a feeling I'll need to understand it once someone wakes up. )

[ One guess at who he's talking about. ]

the next time sam anders gets a wink of sleep

[onemind]

[Dreams are strange things. Tonight, they unfold like a murmur of a breeze through an open window on a still day. A child's summer day, a mother's gentle kiss on an elbow scraped red - that fascimile of ancient organic memory planned for and planted in you from someone far distant, someone long dead.

Dead. Kara Thrace was dead once. Black matter and pulped flesh and metal. There's a crowbar in hand. Lever a layer of hard pressed matter up to reveal the beating viscera of what lives under it. That's what it should be like. Instead the egg cracks and sunshine streams out of it, blindingly bright. Blink it back. The light above swims slowly into focus as the eyes adjust. Far above you, your wife is leaning out of the cockpit of her Viper painted with a thousand kill shillohuettes. You fell, you remember. Didn't you? You hit your head?

"Sam? Doing all right there?"

She sounds closer than she is: a murmur in the ear from across the comm in the tell tale heartbeat of a pause as your ship clicks into place in the airlock. "Sam? Longshot, come in." Crackling over the comm. She's waiting for you to say something. Instead, the launch mechanism triggers - slingshots the ship down the tube. The viper punches into space, a thousand brittle dots of light in an ink black universe.

On one of those distant dots: a breeze, murmuring through an open window and across the face. Spread your fingers. Sunlight streams through them. Blink.

"Doing all right there?," someone who you know but don't recognize asks. She gives you a frank look from where she's standing by the open window, observing the landscape beyond it. There's a gun slung heavily on her shoulder and a smell of ash and smoke in the air. The room is riddled with debris and broken wood. Look up. There's a hole in the ceiling. You fell, didn't you?

"You've been out for--" she checks her watch. "About twenty minutes. Ready to move?" Eventually you are. Eventually you and her pick your way from the crumbling structure and make your way down the hillside and into the scorched valley where ground crunches to ash and dust underfoot. Every bone of this place has been rendered into something baser, something that tastes of grit on the tongue. In the distance a dark transport ship slices through the grey cloud coverage and touches down. Dust swirls. You close your mouth and eyes against the sting and--

Dreams end. This one does too.]

why this

[frakkincylons]

Day 40: morning

[vocalis]

[ After using his abilities the other night, Aoba's woken up with a migraine. He probably should've come to see Sam before knocking out, but it couldn't be helped. When he reaches out he's clumsy, fumbling through a haze of pain. ]

Hey... Sam?

[ He's trying to contain it, but some of that pain leaks over the connection. Sorry for your head, Sam. ]

[frakkincylons]

[ the pain blossoms bright in the forefront of his mind, twined in with Aoba’s voice, and he’s reaching back to answer, something soothing in the mental tone of it. ]

( Ouch, kiddo. You okay over there? )

[vocalis]

[ It takes a minute. A slow processing time made slower by the pain. That isn't Sam's voice... well, it is, but it's not-

Not again. ]

Damnit. I mean... sorry. I think I reached out to... the wrong Sam...

[ This is not the Sam he was looking for. ]

[erbier]

[ Her head turns, long before the ship would even have been in sight. The closing distance between them is a rippling sensation, a frequency growing louder, pushing on her. She stares upwards into the sky for a long moment, lips set into a thin line. It's as though they can't resist. Steven had done this to her as well, rising out of the dark, and for what? Only stubbornness, she assumes. Not out of any real desire to live this new life well. Irritating. She turns her back on the pull in the sky, and goes to wait for the inevitable.

She had cried when he had gone, for the first time in too many years. For a moment, she had thought it might be a relief. That she had broken some kind of curse that had kept her from tears. But as she watched more and more hosts, then the rest of her brood disintegrate, she had reconsidered. She remembered what a waste tears were. Grief was a wasted emotion when you already knew so far in advance that demise was imminent. Let mourning be someone else's task.

Her annoyance has mostly cooled by the time he is on the ground. She does not rush out to meet him, and would not even if their mission were less covert. All she offers by greeting is a distant, ]

( Sam. )

[frakkincylons]

[ it's fine that she doesn't rush to meet him, because he certainly does to her. sam had known very well, before falling into a coma (that doesn't feel to him nearly as long as he's been told it was), that he's by far the most openly affectionate and honestly emotional of all the others in his brood, steve included. there's no shame in that, he thinks, and it should hardly be a surprise to ilde by now either. ]

( Ilde. )

[ his voice echoes back to her, before he even emerges from the ship, the pull to her seeming so much magnified by the absence of all the others. the yawning chasm where Ren, Steve, Anakin and Jessica used to be. he's first to drop from the transport, and doesn't take any searching to find her in the crowd of the other hosts waiting, under the cover of night where they're being dropped off. his feet carry him fast, and he knows there's stiffness and distance with her, can feel it coming off in waves, but sam's never been able to help how he is.

pulling her immediately into a hug, even an awkward one, a hand pets over the back of her head, and there's a flow of sorrow and loss, with such guilt and worry for her buried in. ] ( I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry. )