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f20202020-09-23 03:48 pm
FINALE: Synod & Conclusion
The Synod should have ended on the 21st, but a blackout traps all the attendees in the facility. The train won't move. The Gates won't reverse. The anomaly outside would eradicate anything attempting to cross the stygian wasteland. All anyone can do is wait.
A hastily-assembled team of various faction members rushes to the Porter's defense. When they arrive, they find that their extremist opponents are imPorts themselves. Some of them might have once been called friends. Others have remained in the shadows, sleeper forces of the Resistance. While the saboteurs continue their work, fighters leap into battle against all those who've arrived to defend the Porter.
[OOC: Please tag the above top-level if you'd like some mod-run NPC combat! We'll be able to back/tag several PCs for at least 2 weeks from today.]
Not only must enemy combatants be defeated, but a complex series of timed explosive devices threatens to destroy the Porter controls, forcing a desperate call for technical experts and finesse powers.
Only partway into the showdown, a minor explosion rips through the crowd and takes out combatants on both sides. An alarm begins to scream. Total annihilation has been averted, but the Porter's shields are crumbling.
ESCAPE THE SYNOD
Though the terrorists are now in custody, there's a bigger problem. The facility is no longer safe. The Gates, echoing the damaged Porter, still haven't reversed polarity. Everyone will have to escape via the Death Train, which isn't equipped for so many imPorts in high concentration. It'll need additional shielding and the reprogramming for multiple trips, which means tech-minded imPorts will have to cooperate to overcome its automated settings.
ImPorts must divide into smaller groups because the destination station at the White City may overload too. Batches of ImPorts pile together for the ride in much more cramped quarters than they're used to. Several are injured from the attack, others are dying, and it'll be a long and harrowing journey before they can reach a hospital for treatment. ImPorts steal moments for hurt and comfort, as well as moments of revelation and intimacy.
Even for those left unscathed, they must swiftly transfer through the White City and travel back to their home factions via conventional means, or risk causing dimensional chaos as more ImPorts arrive behind them.
Once the Death Train arrives at the White City with the last of the Synod attendees on board, it seems like the worst is over. While anyone wanting to leave the city is free to use conventional means to do so, some choose to remain in Florida to recuperate, strategize or tend to the wounded.
For three days, everything looks like it might be returning to normal.
ImPorts are likely to resume life as usual, continuing with politicking and personal lives alike. After all, there's a year to go until the next Synod-- and despite everything, new ImPorts still arrive through the battered Porter facility.
DEATH DOME EXPANDS
On September 26th, sensors indicate a wave of cosmic radiation moving toward the White City. The reason is obvious enough: damage to the Porter has destabilized the Death Dome and now it's rapidly expanding. If it isn't stopped, it'll swallow the city within days. After that, scientists fear it may tear through the entire planet.
The White Tower immediately puts out a call for aid. Citizens of the city will have to be evacuated en masse. They plead for every imPort who is able to come forward and work to halt the growth of the Dome using whatever means necessary. If they don't work together, no one's getting out of this alive.
Most terrifying of all, the Death Dome's "cosmic radiation" causes permanent death, shredding and scattering energy and matter across the multiverse. Unshielded contact means no resurrection within this world ever again. To those who dream of someday returning to home dimensions, the mysteries of these physics is steeped with terrifying unknowns.
[OOC: Per this OOC plotting question, contact with the Death Dome destroys the AU version of a character permanently, but not their MoM counterpart. See the thread for more details.]
Anyone Porting in during the Death Dome expansion, whether for the first time or resurrecting, finds the Porter facility is horrifically unstable. Heavy strands of permanently lethal entropic energy weave through visible cracks in the walls. They must escape through a Gate as quickly as possible, or risk an untimely death!
Under pressure, it might be harrowing to choose an ImPort city and faction. No sooner than they do, and step through the Gate, that they find that the world is in uproar, though their new home may well be in denial, strategically or otherwise.
Faced with a cosmic anomaly, ImPorts take heroic measures in the ground and air in Florida and beyond to save natives and perhaps even their kind alike.
[OOC: The above character 'sub-rosters' reflect the IC involvement based on this plotting form. We'll attempt to link top-levels here, and further incorporate your RP into a conclusion post on or by October 1. Feel free to top-level, and of course backtag/sandbox indefinitely!]
At the nth hour, on September 30, two ImPorts, Shouta and Tomura of Equality Before Law make it into the Porter and manage, incredibly, to stabilize the damaged Fate technology with use of reality-warping abilities.
As the Death Dome begins to shrink back to its original circumference, it leaves behind a bizarre, scarred landscape, and a fine dusting of eerie crystalline particles of inscrutable chemical makeup. It may take years before the land is arable again, but the day is saved. For now.
OOC Links
- Plotting Post
- Volunteer signup: Resistance Extremists
- Volunteer signup: Porter Defenders
- Plotting form: Finale Roles
- Reminder: 'Hacking the Death Train' does not require signups (unlimited slots), and sharing your finale role is not mandatory.
no subject
Audio, audio, where... )
Pepper.
( That was right in her earpiece, whoops. In the bed, Tony remains unmoving, oblivious to the lack of shackles, the two people coming to his aid. Some finessing gets him tapped into FRIDAY's broadcasting capabilities, and the external speakers in the suit: )
Oh, thank... honey, how did you get here? How long have you been here? What's going on downstairs?
Please tell me you brought someone who can wake me up.
( Sorry, Pepper, he's just gonna briefly hijack 49's scanners to have a look at Strange, mystified. )
no subject
[Okay sure, Stephen is generally unflappable, but you know when you put your headphones on and forget to check the volume so your favourite song comes on so painfully loud that you physically jump out of your skin? Yeah, that's what suddenly hearing Tony's voice coming out of the suit Pepper is encased in feels like to Stephen, completely with a somewhat undignified surprised jerk to the side.]
Did that just... come out of you?
[He stares at Pepper in the suit for several seconds, processing what's happening before his eyes drift across to the static form of the former High Chancellor. Stephens shoulders sag.]
Oh, you've got to be kidding me. [Having not heard Tony call Pepper's name first directly into her ear, Stephen doesn't immediately realise that the petname is directed earnest at her and not sardonically at him.] Well, this is just great. So, what, are we supposed to download you onto a jump drive or something now?
[No, probably not, probably some good old fashioned astral projection... But not before a healthy dose of crossed wires and confusion, no doubt.]
no subject
Tony?
[ Pepper looks from the prone form on the bed to Strange and back to Stark... or Tony?, bewildered-- cautious hope slowly beginning to edge out the confusion with every passing moment. That did not sound like the High Chancellor she's dealt with thus far. Or maybe she's simply deluding herself yet again. ]
How are you doing this...? [ Technopathy what now? She shakes her head without waiting for an answer. ] You know what, never mind that now. We need to get you out of here, first.
[ That's their priority. Everything else could wait. Maybe this will make more sense if they can just wake him up. Pepper glances at Strange again, directing her question to the wizard, ]
I don't suppose you know how to pull someone out from a psychically induced coma?
no subject
( a beat, )
I'm inside you now. ( be a little less smirking when you say that, Tony, but he'll clarify: ) Your suit. Pepper, where's J? Who's the cape?
( there might be some sizing up here, some goatee-tweaking-in-the-frequency. should he be Concerned, Pepper? )
no subject
I suppose if anyone would be able to still be an insufferable ass even in a coma it'd be Stark...
[Glancing back at Pepper, he gives a single-shouldered shrug.]
This is probably one of those rare occasions when, as it happens, yes, I do. Theoretically speaking. He probably won't like it though. Arguably, all the more reason to do it.
[Talkin' about you, not to you, Tony.]
no subject
Thank god. ]
Indubitably, [ she agrees dryly to Strange's remark, but slight concern pricks at her even then. Tony asks about JARVIS and doesn't seem to know Strange... ]
He's a friend, Tony. Don't worry, we'll fix this. There's time for questions later.
[ Well, hopefully, but they really probably shouldn't tarry in this room. Pepper heaves a small sigh of relief, nodding her head at Strange's explanation with gratitude and determination both in her blue eyes. ]
Do it. We don't exactly have a choice at the moment. [ Sorry, bae, you get no say. ]
no subject
And what's this friend's name? Pepper, if he's your hall pass, it's fine. Seems redundant, but, hey!
( Louder now, like he's chasing Stephen back across the room. The digital alarm clock on the bedside table winks off and on, and then proceeds to emanate a very urgent: )
Do what? No; hold on a sec, what's he doing? Pepper!
no subject
[God, it really is one of those days when you find yourself grumbling at an alarm clock...]
This shouldn't take long--[That's said to Pepper with a brief glance over his shoulder as he walks to the bed.]--but just cover me while I work. Oh, and it might look a little weird. Just... trust the process.
[Outwardly, it doesn't look like much as Stephen lays a hand on Tony's very still forehead and gives a very light push down, then draws his hand up about a foot from Tony's prone form.
In the context of the Astral Dimension, however, it's a bit more dramatic.
Stephen's astral form hovers at the bedside as the outward gesture of his flesh and blood hand has the practical effect of ripping Tony's astral form from his body pretty abrasively.]
This never gets old. [He says with a smirk before he frowns and squints at the form he's yanked out of the High Chancellor's body. It's not exactly what he'd been expecting.] ...huh. How about that.
no subject
[ At least he appears to be back to his old self, if nothing else? ]
It's gonna be okay, [ she goes on to reassure Tony more audibly when his anxiety spikes, almost in tandem with Strange's less gentle remark. She hopes she didn't just make a liar out of herself... But there's little time to dwell on that with a task to do, and Pepper nods her agreement to stand guard while Strange works-- albeit looking a little unsure when he goes on. ]
Weird. Right. [ SHRUG? ] I'll keep an eye out.
[ Glancing toward the door, she sics FRIDAY to keep an eye on things while she waits, with no small amount of anxiousness of her own. ]
no subject
Stop. doing. things to my body, please, ( this very clearly younger Tony blurts out, an exasperated scold that almost sees Stephen's hand slapped away. Gone are the many careworn wrinkles, the silver in his hair and beard. The loss of ten years and its incomprehensible stressors have added weight and a healthy tan back, just the same as he was when they first met in this other world.
He takes in Strange's certain bizarre, ghostly aura and then his own, turning his hands over to stare at the odd translucence until he pegs that he can see his body. Y'know, the one still lying in the bed? )
Was this supposed to help? ( He doesn't spring to his feet so much as float himself upright, much like a cat that's been recently spooked. This is monumentally distressing, cool. )
What did you do to me?