SEPTEMBER 14TH, 2020: THE SYNOD IS CONVENING.

[modormenace]

All fourteen Gates simultaneously reverse polarity. For the next seven days, and only these seven days, any imPort stepping through a Gate will arrive safely in the Porter building: the only place on this fractured planet that can safely contain the energy of the imPort community in its entirety.

SO IT BEGINS
THE SYNOD

THE

DEATH

TRAIN

While the Gates are the simplest form of transportation, those making the journey to the Synod from the White Tower have the option of travelling by train, if they wish. Despite the playfully grim moniker, there haven't been any recorded fatalities on board the Death Train in many years. Or ever, really. Raw, untamed entropy doesn't do anything as simple as kill.

For that delightful reason, passengers will be reminded at frequent intervals not to attempt to leave the train once it enters the active zone of the Porter's defenses, or to do anything that could jeopardise the integrity of its shielding.

The journey is relatively comfortable and takes approximately two and a half hours. A limited menu of pastries and alcohol is available from the buffet car. The smallest tables seat two.

 

As the train passes through the entropy-saturated wasteland of the Deathdome, the view from the heavily tinted windows of each of the train's four-person cars is impossible to comprehend: every atom of the landscape is in a constant state of flux, scattered in endless possibilities across the multiverse.

WELCOME CARPET

Inside, you get the impression of three towers; no view from outside is possible. You're totally sealed inside for the week, by the same Fate-built tech that shields this place from the ravages of cosmic radiation— the train station is built into the structure, entrance tunnel hermetically sealed.

You're greeted by welcome robots, primitive little things full endless enthusiasm and covered in dents. What they lack in intelligence they make up for in persistence and durability. Each and every ImPort is assigned their own personal robutler.

Though they tend to hinder more than help.

Boop boop boop boop. They provide you with a complimentary swag bag. Inside is one (1) t-shirt, one (1) top of the line tablet (pre-loaded with this year's Agenda and a simple game app that looks suspiciously like 2048), a stress ball, personalised souvenir pen and eraser (but no pencil), and of course, a lanyard keycard for accessing the comfortably adequate accommodations provided for all attendees.

Given the week-long Synod, your room itself is a decent suite, furnished with dark colors, redolent with a smell you can't quite place. You may find yourself assigned an unexpected roommate, which may feel awkward considering you'll find arrayed on the beds, a half-dozen complimentary tickets to the spa, restaurants and the power gym, with its preternaturally durable equipment.

Robutlers constantly remind: do not attempt to leave the Porter facility or do anything to jeopardise the integrity of its shielding.

CONVENTION

Talks and panels take place in the convention area, which feels like a miniature city within the Porter's defenses, a hive with padded audience seats, wide stages, and complete with holographic audiovisual equipment that's curiously compatible with presentation software from every city.

Here, ImPorts will present and debate various topics regarded as major concerns for all. [OOCly, players are invited to suggest topics! Scroll down; they will be added below.]

This is also something of an expo, where cities practically demonstrate— or show off their good works. From the latest hovertechnology models to demonstrations of healing powers, playful duels in the forcefield-enclosed stages to magical books that temporarily transfer skills on touch, this is the place to pretend you're showing off your cards... while playing the most important ones close to your chest.

PANELS AND DEBATES

PRESENTERS

TOPIC

Joseph Kavinsky vs [N/PC]

White Tower ImPort Overpopulation and Dimensional Instability

Tony Stark and other technopaths

How Technology Will Save Us

Joshua Foley

The Mysteries and Intricacies of ImPort Physiology

Count Dooku and volunteers

ImPort Factions Must Align Against the Shared 'Resistance' Threat

Jin Bubaigawara (x3)

The Twin Cities are NOT Dimensionally Unstable No Matter What You Heard

Kang

Bridging Old and New: Maintaining Infrastructure with Limited Modern Resources

EVENING

EVENTS

Every night of the Synod, ImPorts gather to dine in a grand hall with a ballroom party. Each dinner is hosted by one ImPort city, gruntwork complete with robutlers-- which guarantees food safety, and complete with multiple cuisine options, cultural decor, and entertainment.

Given the range of cities represented, food options vary from greasy burgers to six courses of seafood and blue venison, and rarefied vegan fare.

When ImPorts aren't here eating, they're most often talking. Ergo, it's not uncommon for low-key drama to break out, but this year, the majority of Synod days seem to be passing uneventfully.

Fortunately, speeches are reserved for daytime. After dinner, it's time to dance.

 

The last song of the night is always obscure music no one can quite remember the words or melody to afterward. It's a slow dance song meant for two or more partners; the ballroom grows dark and the world seems to fade away. Or rather, it just fades back into one's hotel room.

THE BLACKOUT

On Monday, September 21st, shortly before the Gates are due to resume ordinary function and allow attendees to leave, the Porter building suffers a power cut.

Abruptly, all the lights cut out. Music stops. Your faithful robutler freezes in place, unresponsive— though its internal systems appear to be running, the centralised command hub that it relies on has fallen silent.

Though the robutlers are out of comission, technology-minded ImPorts and their tech drones hasten to reassure that systems analyses are underway. Within a few hours, repairs begin, the estimated time being two days.

In the meantime, thanks to the diversity of powers on hand, there is enough food and water. Candles start to circulate. It might even be a little romantic, if it weren't for the chaos outside. Characters might find themselves trapped in an elevator for a few hours, or compelled to seek comfort from one another.

Comments

[reydacted]

She laces their hands together, bringing one to her mouth as she kisses his knuckles before dropping their hands to hang between them as they walk together. She's mostly quiet through their journey, leaning her head against his shoulder in the lift back to their suite.

Distantly, she thinks that even now it's not entirely an act. She had never stopped caring for him, and she knows that he cares deeply for the empire they built together. But their paths had forked-- at first slowly, and then all at once. It's just such a shame his utility has run out. Maybe it's merciful in a way to spare him in having to choose between flourishing power and their empire. And, of course, maintaining the unity of the White Tower in the process rather than allowing any discourse to continue further. This was for their people, he had to understand that of course.

"Ten years," she offers almost absentmindedly, wistfully. "I had never imagined this is what we would build."

[houseparty]

He wondered at that, how long she planned for this moment, and if her affection now is just another easy lie. It should sting, but as he lightly nuzzles his jaw into her soft hair, and strokes his thumb slow and gentle against hers, he lets that thought go. Familiarity alone hadn't made him love her, as they cultivated the faction and rose to prominence together; Rey's drive, her energy, her passion were enthralling, even as their aims eventually divided. Maybe he's always known she would be the very end of him, temporarily or no.

"It's remarkable," he agrees, thoughtful, "Starting from scratch the way we did. I never wanted to be a politician." A late confession, Stark supposes, wry even now. "We always have made a great team."

[reydacted]

"You think I did?" Her question is earnest. She smiles, her nose wrinkling and cheeks dimpling. It's a far, far cry from the cloak she wears each day as a parliamentarian or First Lady. It's almost like a window to the past Rey, fiery but light and hopeful all the same. Her strength had always been her resilience, her endurance, her killer survival instinct. She could still be feral on the legislative floor, but it was rare that she could be so genuine off of it in recent years.

Still, her laugh lacks the warmth that it once contained.

"We were never satisfied. Always hungry to keep moving forward. Eager to keep going," she comments, as the numbers ding higher and higher. They pushed each other in a way that she couldn't have imagined another partner might have. Together they grew this garden, carefully tending it and now it had bloomed into something truly magnificent.

But all gardens require... pruning.

"Just don't tell me you regret it," she jokes as the doors slide open.

[houseparty]

Anyone else, for either of them, wouldn't have made it through the cultivation. All the tender feelings in the world wouldn't have kept Pepper by his side; she and Strange would make better allies. Would things have gone differently? He doesn't know, and truthfully? He doesn't care to know. The brief view of that other life, that wasn't his life, his choices. Stark would rather stand firm and face what is to come, than allow himself to falter for what-ifs that were never meant to be.

"Well," he hedges, feigning indecision while he slips his hand of hers to glide a gentle path to the center of her back, benign, after you, darling, "No. Promise me, you won't regret this either."

[reydacted]

She shakes her head as she enters their suite, "I've never been so sure."

And it's not an exaggeration. She had been more naive than certain the first time she tried to fetch Kylo from the grasps of a dark master. Her doubts only grew when she asked him to stay at the White Tower. Now, though, she was wrenching control of her own destiny.

She leads him to sit on the edge of the suites bed. Gently brushing the side of his face, she presses a command into his mind, "Disable your droids."

[houseparty]

There's nothing more to say then, is there?

Stark takes a seat, unbuttoning his jacket as just a force of well-ingrained habit, and sits himself higher as Rey's directive takes hold. It's immediate, an infiltration that feels... really, like he had the idea himself the whole time.

Both Legion droids flanking the door slouch almost imperceptibly, in a cascade of system errors that turn to hard shutdowns, his influence withdrawn like hands receding from a marionette's strings.

[reydacted]

"I'm not going to enjoy doing this," she sighs as if she is talking about some unpleasant chore she's been tasked with completing. She holds the side of his face reverently for another moment admiring him. No, she won't regret it. This needs to be done, and she needs to sever the cord. He is what's holding her and the White Tower back from being truly all powerful.

She steps away from him, lifting the droids with the Force to at least give the appearance that they were responsive to an attack on Stark before she rips a gauntlet from one.

Weighing it in her hand, she turns back to him, "These were a real marvel. Barnes never stood a chance."