revivalproject | It's just another day

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It's just another day

WHO: Drake and whoever happens to find him, despite his best efforts
WHERE: Cave/Research office/”Severe” subdivision
WHAT: Coping via avoidance and overworking
WHEN: Post-Event
WARNINGS: None as of yet

Off the prison bus

It hadn’t been the first time that Drake had felt helpless, but his time in the false reality had been one of few times he’d look back on and feel he’d been utterly useless. The entire time, he remembered having an underlying knowledge that everything was wrong, somehow. That his thoughts weren’t his own, but were reinforcing themselves with their own will.

At night, he dreamed of a standing pool of bright water, and during the day, strange letters and numbers, symbols, words and concepts popped into his conscious mind. He was constantly having flashbacks that weren’t his. And underlining it all was a feeling that he was supposed to be doing something much more important than approving cafeteria menus and developing a standardized curriculum. Something grander than the heroes. Bigger than the city. Vaster and more humbling than any petty human constructs, rituals, or squabbles between nations on Earth.

Now he knew what it was, and that he was separated from it, stranded with no way home. Fresh from emerging from the invasive and frightening effects of a complete memory stamp. Like everyone else still milling, confused, embarrassed, or disappointed, nearby.

Drake retreated to a nearby wall and stood against it like a mouse seeking safety and stayed still there for a long time, looking listless and shell shocked.

Research offices

So rather than do something healthy, like talk about it, he did what he always did when he didn’t want to think: he worked.

In the monastic silence of an old research lab, he sat in a corner on the floor with his knees drawn up in the twilit semi-darkness of emergency lighting, surrounded by clips and cables and scribbled notes about Agrii technology that he thought were important and complex enough that he might not be able to figure them out on his own if he gave up his current expertise. A few power and/or control crystals lay in a carefully arranged pattern beside him and his face was uplit from his tablet while he ran diagnostics and recalibrated various systems on the mobile probe he’d brought back from Coruscant. He didn’t know what time it was, but it was probably either very late or very early, judging by how hunger and exhaustion had come and, finding themselves ignored, gone away again.

Needless to say, he was not expecting anyone to find him.

Green Sector Residences

He would also attempt to explore the strange, fenced in complex nearby in an effort to find out if there was any usable equipment within. An armoury. Intact lab equipment. Any records indicating what it used to be. Or maybe just a room that looked comfortable and safe to inhabit.

From the outside, Drake might be seen trying to find a way through or over the fence, and if there isn’t already a hole or a gate, he isn’t above taking bolt cutters to it if he can find a pair.

From the inside, he could be observed by the unsteady waving of a flashlight as he makes his way through dim, cracking hallways, testing doors and elevators, trying water faucets and light switches, and hoping that the floor doesn’t collapse beneath him.

He probably should have put out a network post calling for help to scour the place; if nothing else, it would let everyone now where he was in case something happened to him. But he wasn’t always the most careful with his own safety.

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Back when he first came to Agra 10 this building used to be the one Jon had claimed to be staying in. He hasn’t stayed there long, though, quickly finding the former library and ending up actually living there.

Now Jon isn’t one to be drawn by sentimentalities. He isn’t seeking out an old home or checking back on whether he has forgotten anything. Which would be ridiculous after over a year anyway. Instead, he is drawn by a rather strong sense of anxiety hanging potently over the place.

He knocks once before letting himself in.

Casting a brief look around is more an old habit than a necessity. Jon already knows where the source of this particular brand of dread lingers and he makes a simple offer: “I can leave if you don’t want me here.”

The knock takes Drake entirely by surprise, and his whole posture tenses as he curls up with a jerk and looks up.

He does nothing but stare with wide, intense eyes for several seconds. 'I can leave'? What on earth sense does that make? Did he miss something? It sounded like he'd missed something preceding that statement. 'I brought some cookies, but I can leave if you like.' 'Just stopped by for a chat, but if you want to be alone...' 'Pardon me, Doctor, but there's a device we've found that's emitting a strange energy pattern that looks remarkably like an electroencephalogram and well it's imprinting a foreign personality on people, can you look at it? Ah, I see you're not finished with your lunch, I can come back later.'

Drake squints in the semi-darkness at the stranger, trying make him out beyond a vague outline.

"Were you looking for me?"

"Hmm. No." Jon admits. "Not necessarily. I was... Curious." Which isn't a lie, but quite possibly an odd answer to give.

Though Jon doesn't linger there. Instead, he vaguely gestures around the room, the notes, bits and pieces lying about. "You were busy here. But- Are you okay?"

Starling was out on a walk to clear her head after another almost-therapy session with someone, when she spotted that familiar tousle of blond hair trying to scramble his skinny ass up a fence.

"Hey, I hear that goes better if you have a boost," she called out.

It is an odd answer to give, and Drake makes a confused and unflattering expression by scrunching his nose so his teeth are showing as if he were squinting into the sun.

After a few moments, the confusion shifts to suspicion.

"Yyyyyes. Well. Someone's got to be. ... Why are you concerned? Or should I say curious?"

Jon frowns at the other man's attitude, then shakes his head with a shrug. "My reasons or excuses hardly matter at this point. I came across you in your oddly isolated position." He gestures around the room and then at Drake sitting on the floor in the corner of it. He won't even bother formulating a question about any of this. The Agrii have a history of pulling some rather eccentric individuals to this planet. Of which Jon hardly is an exception.

Almost there...! Except not really. Drake was only perhaps a third the way up the fence, boots too big to get a secure foothold and teeth clamped around the handle of a set of cheap, rusty wire cutters that he hoped could take care of the barbed wire at the top (but that he didn't trust with making a big enough hole to clamber through at the bottom) when Clarice called out to him. He whipped around so quickly that he lost his grip and fell into the underbrush with a startled yelp.

There was a groan and a muffled procession of thuds and rustling from somewhere within the bushes, followed by a variety of expletives in both human and alien languages. Eventually, he emerged from the undergrowth, picking leaves and twigs from his hair and grumbling about how he'd probably been bruised down to the bone and would be sore for months.

When Drake reached her - or rather, got as close as he was comfortable with, maybe ten or fifteen feet away - he folded his arms in a way that looked defensive and said flatly,

"Director."

....without quite meeting Clarice's eyes.

Ezra's immediate reaction to the spell breaking had been relief to the point of a few tears. Obi-wan - and it looked like everyone else - was back; the wound Ben had taken was gone, so everyone was probably ok...on the physical level.

Sorting all the mental and emotional would take longer, he knows. He'd gotten a quick hug from his ~~brother~~ master, and then detached to circle around the rest of the crowd. He'd had both sets of memories for a month, so he's probably more settled and better emotionally equipped right now than most of the rest, he reasons.

He spots the man he remembered as his principle in the City staring off into space. "Mr. Riley?" he checks, gently.

Drake looks awfully skeptical at that.

"Well that's not cryptic at all, is it?" He finally puts his tablet down. "You just happened across me in, as you say, an isolated area? Just out for an evening stroll, were you?"

He's absolutely not buying that this is a random encounter, and is starting to suspect that he was followed. He just can't work out why. At home, he was frequently sought out for some emergency or another, fix this, code that, find out why, figure it out, etcetera. But here....here, there seemed to be fewer planet threatening problems that a quick thinking scientist with the resources of the Royal Air Force could solve. There seemed to be less of everything, in fact.

"Oh, shit--" She exclaimed, rushing forward to try and close the space between them the moment she saw him fall. She didn't make it far enough, though, as he stopped short and folded his arms. Damn. There was that wall of his. And she'd felt like they'd made some progress chipping away at it on Coruscant.

"You were the first sign I had that something was wrong," she said, as quietly as she could while still letting her voice carry. "I should've paid more attention. I'm sorry. Are you ... are you okay? Not just the fall. But that, too."

"I'm sorry." Jon says. By this point that's almost an automatic response to being accused of acting cryptic.

"Indeed, I had no real reason to come around this place. I just... Felt drawn here." Which isn't a lie. And he shrugs. "I did use to stay in this building myself before moving into the old library."

Hearing his name jolts Drake out of the reverie, although his arms remain tightly and defensively folded, and his eyes dart back and forth between Ezra's as he puts the pieces into place. As the principal, he'd memorized every one of his students. And this was...

"Ezra..." he breathes after a few moments. But though the second syllable has a downward intonation, it seems like more of a question than an acknowledgement. He had just begun to fret that perhaps a good 94% of the city's population had been completely fake, and he had no way of knowing which ones until he met all the Real people.

"Are you..... You're real?"

For a moment, Drake looked a little confused, and more than a little vulnerable. But it washed away with a glance to the right.

"I'll live." Which was more than he could have promised a few years ago, so at least there'd been some progress. "Though I've probably got permenant spinal damage, now."

"Oh Jesus Christ," she sighed, out of equal parts exasperation and concern. "What the hell were you try'na do climbin' that thing all by your damn self, anyway?"

Curious?

Drawn here?

Despite Jon having not said much at this point, everything he has said has only raised more questions for Drake's guarded and suspicious mind.

"Stay here? D'you mean, as in...live here?" He asks with a raised eyebrow and open confusion before taking a short, pointless glance around the room, as if perhaps he missed the bedroom and kitchenette. "In an old research and development building?"

Ezra offers a tentative, gentle smile.

"Yeah, I'm real. I called a town meeting in Temba a while back, remember? We didn't really have a chance to talk, then but...you and Lauri-Ell - tall blue lady - got into it a little bit."

As he'd noted and watched carefully, at the time, and would have tried to interview if he'd sensed it would actually come to blows.

Jon shakes his head "Living is hardly a word I would use. I mainly stored some items in here." A shrug. "It seemed like a suitable place for me at the time..." A dark little space for him to hide away in. Suitable for a monster like himself.

But this man seems remarkably normal.

"You are aware that the old hotel in the town center has perfectly usable rooms as well?"

He dropped his arms and gaped openly.

"Excuse you, I had it perfectly well under control!"

For a few moments, Drake just frowns in confusion, but at the mention of a tall blue lady, the frown turns into an outright scowl.

"Right. Her." He wouldn't have called her a lady, himself, but what he'd like to call her wasn't very polite, so that was all he said about that.

He scrubs his hands down his face with a groan.

"What happened? How do I know this is real?"

"I think your ass would say otherwise right about now," she argued, still smirking a bit. "I stand by what I said first off the bat, though: I'll give ya a boost. What d'you figure's in there?"

Drake purses his lips and stares only just long enough to be only just shy of awkward.

"Right. Well. I happen to be doing some research and development," he gestures at the large, wheeled probe, "so. Seems as suitable a place as any, given I'm fairly sure that was its purpose." He hadn't explored thoroughly yet, but when he did, he hoped to discover some usable diagnostic equipment, or even the means to build more complex and sensitive systems.

At the old hotel remark, he pulls one corner of his mouth back uncomfortably. "Yes, I've heard as much, thank you. And when's the last time a structural engineer's been 'round to do an inspection?"

The Archivist stays silent for a moment, then takes a deep breath and closes his eyes almost as if focusing to step over this man's tone and attitude. Which he possibly is.

When those faintly glowing eyes open again, they settle back on Drake. "The same time someone did an inspection on this building. If safety is your concern, staying there remains the more reasonable choice as there will be others around to actually notice the building collapsing."

He gives those words a moment to settle, then adds: "I'm Jonathan Sims. I work on the library - And I live there."

Drake glowered as he subconsciously rubbed a sore spot at the base of his spine, (His ass.) absolutely sure something was out of alignment.

"No idea. But it's fortified, so hopefully worth the effort." With a sigh and a wave to follow if she wanted, he disappeared back into the underbrush as he squatted down to look for the wire clippers he'd dropped.

"Might have an armoury, or lab equipment. Maybe an infirmary with medical supplies, though I doubt I'd trust any pharmaceuticals. Ah! There you are!" He straightened, clippers in hand, and used them to gesture with, "Vehicles, technology. Or maybe just a bunch of cell blocks and a vat of fossilized gruel."

Edited 2021-06-22 22:39 (UTC)

"Well, um, good questions," Ezra admits.

"Dunno how to prove the second part to you. First part - I'm a little sketchy on the details. One of the other Tembarians, Billy, can alter reality. He made the City and most of the people in it. I think he was trying to protect himself. Maybe all of us."

"Well at least this building's only half as many storeys...high...." He squinted in the semi-darkness. Were his eyes glowing? Or were they reflecting like the retinas of a predator? Or just catching the light in his glasses?

There was only one creature Drake knew of that made the eyes of a person glow, but it wasn't...quite like that.

"Drake Riley." He said slowly. "Doctor Drake Riley. I don't really live anywhere. But do tell me about the library; I was told that the Agrii never developed a writing system."

"Tembarians? What's- excuse me, did you say alter reality?" About 38 different calculations, most of which were concerned with the conservation of energy, crackled through his newly re-minted brain, and he didn't even pause to be grateful that he knew what they meant again.

"Protec-protect himself? From what?"

What was more concerning, was, what was he protecting everyone else from? And how bad was it that a complete and total memory stamp and a false reality were better?

"No written language, indeed." Jon confirms. "The Agrii kept their records in smaller versions of those data points I assume you have already encountered. The ones that were in the library and the school, however, were destroyed. Every single one of them. None of the pieces were salvageable."

"For the most part the library is empty and partially inhabited by mothcats. What available records are presently there, be it in the shape of written or audio format, are information gathered and experiences made by those the Agrii have brought here."

"Billy can definitely alter reality. I've seen it before. And...I'm an empath, among other things, and some people had their powers taken during all this. Mine were muted, but I could still, uh, feel things a little? Most of the people in the city felt like Billy."

Ezra shrugged. "I'm guessing the emotions behind his reasons from some of what I felt, but I know that 'snot very precise. So I don't exactly what set this off, sorry. We'll have to see what he can and is willing to tell us."

Drake gives an almost imperceptible shudder when Jon mentions encountering the data points and (protectively?) clutches a notepad covered in illegible scribbling, countless complex equations, and most importantly, information about Agrii engineering.

He frowns when he hears that the library is mostly empty.

"Shame, that. How far back do those records go? I'm given to understand that there are still people here that were present when the Agrii left the planet. But that was...what a couple hundred years ago?"

"You've seen it? What've you seen, how much can he alter reality? Is this - is this normal for him?"

Drake only nodded at the suggestion that Billy be approached and questioned. It was already the first thing on his list.

"He made a rain storm because he was sad. I'be been told me made...fairgrounds here before. So it's more than small things, that he can change. But I think this is a pretty big step up in size and scope."

Jon gives a small shrug. "Roughly a year. All these records were made by myself and I started when I first was brought here." He has gathered what statements he could from other people, but the majority are personal records of events and discoveries Jon has been aware of. He notices the defensive way Drake acts about his notepad, but doesn't comment on it.

"The ones that were present during the recording of the video I shared are no longer here. These records only exist on the Agrii ship."

She nodded, just taking in his speculations until he was done. "All good possibilities. But you won't know how to use any of it without a data point, for certain. ... I've heard tell there's one specifically for engineering Agrii technology."

"That is horrifying." Drake said, looking horrified. "Has he ever changed who people perceived themselves to be before?

Ezra tilts his head and says cautiously, "He's hardly the only person here with potentially dangerous or mind altering abilities. I certainly don't know the entire history of how Billy's used them."

"What ones are no longer here? The people, or the records? I've definitely been told there're still people here from that time, but no one's been able to tell me how they're still here, if indeed that video is over a hundred years old."

Now he looked uncomfortable, pausing and rounding his shoulders.

"Yes. I know. I actually... I have it already." Then he turned to face her and raised his voice defensively.

"But it was the only efficient way. I could have learned it on my own, I'm completely certain, but this was...was a lot faster, you know, and I'm writing down everything that would have taken me too long to work out on my own so I can get the wretched thing out of my head."

"Yes, there are people around from that earlier instance of the Atroma's show, but none of that particular episode. Or maybe even season. Lord knows how they are organizing these." Jon gives a little huff of irritation at Drake's questions. "I talked to some of those that have since left. Neither of them have been on this planet this entire time, obviously. But time is an aspect that means little to our captors. In case you didn't know: That version of Coruscant we were sent to was several hundred years in the past for those among our group that are actually familiar with the planet or even live on it. And as I already mentioned: These records only exist on the ship the Agrii are staying on."

At that, Drake looked even more bothered, but only nodded his head absently, staring at nothing.

"I should find him. Talk to him. I'm sorry, I- I need to get to work. Thank you. For ah...for checking on me."

"You're welcome," Ezra says, sincerely, still watching the man with concern.

Now, Drake is invested.

"That wasn't obvious, actually. I've known people who've lived for many hundreds of years, but not without outside intervention." Such as an alien symbiote keeping them alive, or technology meant to rejuvenate cells. "So do you know where they went between the times they were here? Or where they are now?"

Had they figured out how to go home?

"And no. I wasn't aware that the planet we visited was relatively hundreds of years younger to anyone who'd otherwise recognise it. D'you think that means anything? Did the Agrii choose that point in time to prevent deserters?"

At this point, Drake would have happily rolled up an office chair and offered a half eaten bag of Cheetos to continue this enlightening conversation, except that he had neither.

Memories and thoughts were still coming back to him, and they were doing it do fast that they were tripping over themselves and getting tangled up. So when Drake pushed away from the wall, it was to start off in one direction, then stop and take a few steps in another. He repeated this indecisive pattern a couple more times before finally shaking his finger in the air like he'd made up his mind as he headed toward (hopefully) the mouth of the cavern, muttering about his tablet.

Jon sighs, shaking his head. "As far as I know they were sent back to their own worlds, not necessarily remembering the time they have spent away from it. The Agrii did have the technology to send us back on their ship, but it was literally removed from it while we were on it after rescuing them. No other ship was nearby and yet the device got replaced by an energy core we needed to figure out first before being able to get the ship moving again. The Agrii may no longer be the ones bringing people here. Ga Re, in fact, wanted to sent us all home."

He takes a step towards a nearby counter and lightly pokes at one of the pieces of whatever it is Drake is working on in here. "Coruscant was chosen because the Agrii hoped to find some clues there. The time may have been coincidental, but we did find that Holocron message. Not that that one has been any more reassuring."

This is precisely the kind of information Drake had been after, with varying degrees of success, and while he should probably be suspicious of its source, a stranger who'd just stumbled on him in this precise room in this precise building in this out-of-the-way district, he's too invested, now, scribbling shorthand notes on the back of one of the many papers strewn around on the floor.

"So you were on the ship, then? And someone pulled the old switcheroo on... Oh dear. So you mean that the Agrii no longer have the ability to retrieve or return people? Were you there, did you see what the transportation process looked like when the device was stolen and replaced with the core? How d'you know no other ships were nearby? Proximity sensors? And who figured out how to install and operate the energy core? I might like to compare notes if they're still here."

He taps his pencil on the floor with nervous energy, now seeming to be talking to himself since he's frowning down at his notes instead of looking at Jon.

"Ga Re. That's the uh. Commander of the fleet, so to speak. Why would he want to send everyone home? Have they given up the idea of restoring a planet that's, for all intents and purposes, uninhabitable to them?"

When Jon gently prods the device on the counter, Drake just keeps on without breaking pace or tone or even looking up, "Don't touch that, I don't know what it does yet."

Now he looks up.

"What holocron?"

She blinked, surprised at his admission. She would have thought he was a little too paranoid and squirrely to trust a Data Point so quickly. At his vast efforts to excuse himself, she coughed, swallowing down a smile.

"Of course. ... Though, uh ... I heard tell the only way to get one Data Point erased from your head is to use 'nother one."

Clarice had an excellent read of him, because she was right: Drake was too paranoid and squirrely to trust a Data Point, or any other technology that involved altering a person's brain chemistry, neural pathways, or memories, and especially anything that could add or remove information. In his experience, nothing good had ever come from it; in fact, people had died in some cases.

Besides which, he abhorred the idea that his many years of study and his natural gift for learning and understanding was made not just redundant, but utterly pointless. It was an affront to everything he'd dedicated his life to.

That's why it had been a complete accident during an attempt to study the Data Point and perhaps find a way to download the information to his tablet instead, where he could safely study it and learn from it.

Now, he was trying desperately to see the bright side of having his greatest asset crammed with unwanted information like a marinade injector. It was efficient and he could record everything he knew - which...may take awhile and several novel length textbooks - but then he could be rid of the awful thing and hope it didn't take anything important with it, like his gross motor skills or the word 'the.'

Upon mention that he may not be able to remove the information after all, Drake turned a slow, concerning shade of green and his stomach felt like it was full of upset bees.

"Where did you hear that?"

Concern settled on her face in a soft gray cloud at his paling expression. "Oh, hell, who was it ... it was a while ago, I know that much. When I was first meetin' people on Coruscant."

She looked over his shoulder at the ruins as she tried to remember, so that she wouldn't be staring at him and making him uncomfortable. She could understand how unnerved he'd be: touching the Agriculture point had been an experience, as well, and she'd nearly passed out from the effort of trying to absorb it all. So many names, facts, figures... she could only imagine how much more complicated an Engineering point would be. He couldn't have been feeling well.

"I think it was Jonathan, you know, the Archivist. Either him or Cobb." Clarice shifted her gaze back to him. "Do you wanna sit down for a second? You look like you're about to keel."

Right again. Drake could feel a faint coming on and clutched weakly at the fence links for something to lean against while the world started to lose its color.

"I don't- ... I think..."

Fortunately, he felt it early enough to prevent it by sliding down to the ground and taking deep breaths, idly balling and relaxing his fists repeatedly in an effort to lift his blood pressure.

"I'm fine."

He let out a whoosh of air and pulled himself up.

"Let's get over this fence."

He'd deal properly what she'd told him later. Right now, fretting that he'd never be able to remove the data point wasn't going to help.

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It's just another day

Research Lab

Re: Research Lab

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It's not easy bein' green

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Re: It's not easy bein' green

Aftermath

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Re: Aftermath

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(I just noticed your icon text and it's PERFECT)

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(she is sass incarnate, I thank you)

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Re: (she is sass incarnate, I thank you)

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