THE FRACTURED WORLD: ARRIVAL

[modormenace]

 

A

rrival for some goes all but unnoticed. It's a sudden shiver, the sensation of being watched... and then nothing at all. Life continues serenely as it always has. The only indication of any change comes with sleep, wrapped in dreams: vague and distant echo imagery of another life, melting away in the morning.

 

F

or others, arrival is a sharp jolt. In the space of a single blink, they find themselves in an unfamiliar world, surrounded by the trappings of a life they have not lived. They are replacements, spirits taking possession of bodies belonging to people very much like themselves...

 

A

nd for the rest, arrival is a procedure. Routine. Those ported in to the Fractured World wake hazily in the comfortably dim light of the Porter room, laid out on an exam table. Their wounds, if they remember having any, have been healed— and even those who remember their own deaths find themselves miraculously restored. As they regain consciousness, an automatic audio-visual presentation is triggered. Regardless of their backgrounds or physiology, all imPorts 'see' and 'hear' this message as if in their own language:

"Greetings, imPort."

The voice is calm and gently authoritative, almost certainly selected by committee.

"On behalf of the Synod and all imPorts it represents, we welcome you to the planet Earth."

A decidedly non-humanoid robotic arm holds out a palm-sized device and rather insistently demands the new arrival take it. This is the imPort's comm, used for accessing the Porter's database of information, as well as the communications Network— though it won't receive communications from outside the Porter building until carried through one of the many Gates set up in a long, crescent-shaped array on the far side of the room.

As each Gate is approached, information about the faction it leads to flashes up on the comm device's screen. Which will you choose?

THE WHITE TOWER SANCTUM AURORAE KRAKOA HOUSE OF M EMPIRE OF LIGHT EQUALITY BEFORE LAW THE TWIN CITIES OLIN VALE EDEN SEEKERS OF THE NEW DAWN NORTHWESTERN IMPERIUM GREEN PIECE MAD BURNISH LUMINARY

Comments

give them to meeeee /grabby hands

[verunandesu]

The sound of the pottery against the table is what Sypha first notices, then the delicious smell. It takes a moment to fully filter through to her brain as new sensory information: when it does, she looks up at the bearer of tea: a tall man with long black hair. He is silent, a polite step back from the table.

"Thank you," she says, almost automatically, her conscious manners struggling to swim up out of the depths of recall of the story of the twins from two months ago.

"I do not think we have met." There is a faint question in the statement.

Oh, my

[ze_uwu_jun]

Xichen gives a very faint, apologetic smile. Other than the long hair and the forehead ribbon, his clothing seems practical and well-fitting, albeit white and pale blue. Robes don't last ten years, alas.

"I am afraid I could not tell either way. Until a few days ago, the world for me was a little different than what I see and hear now, though it also seems I have been part of the Seekers for ... a while." Rather odd.

"I apologize if I interrupted, but you have been hard at work for a while, and a little refreshment should not go amiss."

[verunandesu]

"Ah, you are newly imPorted, then?" Sypha looks closer at the man with curiosity; his dress is like that of Jiang Yanli and her relatives, but he is unfamiliar to her otherwise. "That happens sometimes; someone is replaced with a version of themselves with no memory of this world. It is disorienting for everyone involved. However, I do not know you as a DawnSeeker."

She sips her tea. "Please do not apologize. This is very good; thank you for bringing it to me."

[ze_uwu_jun]

"I... am not newly ImPorted as such. I have been to the world where everyone was ImPorted for... more than half a year. However, at that time there were no factions or Gates such as now, and by the dates I gather that was perhaps ten years ago. And now I am suddenly here, and yet people know me and there are notes on things that are clearly mine - I simply have no memory of the time or events that have elapsed for these ten years."

He shrugs in slight apology.

"This is where my quarters are, aside from the family home in Jeopardy that still stands, and where I seem to have belonged. From what I have found this far, I would choose so again."

[verunandesu]

Sypha purses her lips and frowns a bit, listening sympathetically to the man's explanation and thinking over it.

"That sometimes can happen," she offers, after he is done. "Being transported through time. Though usually, a person who is imPorted and then dePorted experiences a time back in their own reality."

It has been a very long time since before the Factions, and dwelling on it for too long fills Sypha with a weariness that makes her shoulders slump a bit. She takes another sip of tea, hot and real. She has long given up the dream of going home to Wallachia, of ever seeing her grandfather, Alucard, Trevor...again. The Seekers of the New Dawn is her home now.