illyria_rpg | Welcome to the Illyria!

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Welcome to the Illyria!

Stardate 58561.8: Day One

Now that you've all got your room assignments and communicators, it's time to explore this ship. Please check out the deck plans to figure out where you're going. You can read about some of the existing crew members you might run into here.

Even those of you who may feel right at home on a spaceship will find that the Illyria is definitely a bit... different. Mostly because she's kind of a wreck right now. Whatever it was that threw the ship all the way out here to wherever we are, it really did a number on the ship itself. There's a lot of damaged areas, and several of the ship's systems have been compromised. You'll find that the replicators don't always work right (I asked for hasperat and I got pok tar!?), the turbolifts are unusually persnickety (I said bridge, not engineering!), and the environmental controls in your quarters may not do as they're told (why is it snowing in Room 4J?). Several corridors are blocked by debris, and more often than not the lights are flickering if they're on at all.

So what will you do? Help clean up the mess in the hallways? Try some bizarre alien food in the mess hall? Try and infiltrate restricted areas to get a peek at the ship's systems? Feel free to make your own top level comment, and treat this as a big mingle. Get to know your new crewmates, explore your new home, make friends or enemies, and whatever you do, don't try the gagh. If you need the captain or the first officer, please let a mod know, but try and stick to threading with your fellow new recruits!

(Don't worry about the entry tags for the moment, they will be added shortly. Before we throw ourselves into missions on alien planets, we wanted everyone to have a chance to get to know one another, so please use this opening log as an opportunity to kick off some CR with crewmates and bunk buddies, and if you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask a mod!)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

((She worked as a maid in 1914 and a shopgirl in 1969. She will totally call him out if need be!))

The man's comment gave her pause, and she looked at the replicator with even more distrust that she had before. "I hadn't thought of that. I figured the ones in the mess hall were programmed to just make food and drinks." Martha puts the cup down. "But if things are malfunctioning, who's to say?"

She smiles at him then and holds out a hand. "Martha Jones."

Damn it, people kept doing that. And Bucky knew he should expect it, that it was the polite social action expected upon meeting a stranger... but he couldn't bring himself to reach out, let someone get a grip on him.

"Bucky Barnes," he replied, but kept his distance. He gave her a one-shouldered shrug in lieu of a handshake, the best he could do. "Sorry. I'm not really big on... people." Which had to be the understatement of the century.

Edging to the side, he approached one of the other replicators, studying it with a frown. "I don't even know what to ask it for. You're probably right about these ones being safe... I hope."

Martha dropped her hand to her side with a smile and a shrug of her own.

"Good to meet you Bucky. Or... sorry I'm here might be the better statement?" She's joking though, clearly not taking too much offense at his statement.

She turned back to the replicator. "Perhaps instead of asking for specifics, maybe generalities are better? Like, just asking for tea instead of Earl Gray. Or soup instead of... I don't know... tomato soup." Martha hasn't a clue if that will actually work, but it's worth a try.

"I'm the one who should be apologizing," Bucky said. "It's snowing in my room or I wouldn't be here, but I guess... I need to get used to it anyway."

He knew she was joking, but he also knew he was very much in the wrong, here. He'd learned to function in society at large again, but that was different - farmers in the market selling him fruit didn't give a shit who he was, or want to get to know him. People here would.

Remembering the market gave him an idea. He never had gotten to eat his breakfast yesterday. Or hundreds of years ago, depending on how you looked at it, but his body was convinced yesterday was more than long enough ago. "Computer, can you make fruit?"

"Affirmative. Specify."

"Plums."

"Specify."

Bucky grimaced. "So much for trying to be general. Uh... fuck, I don't know. Earth plums. Romanian."

There was a soft hum and a glitter of gold in the machine, and a moment later a pair of roughly spherical objects appeared on the tray.

They absolutely could not be described as 'plums'. He wasn't sure they actually deserved a description of 'fruit'. Bucky sighed. "Figures."

Reaching out, he scooped up the objects and bit into one. It was sour to the point of making his eyes water, and he suppressed an urge to cough as he swallowed it.

"Snowing in your room? How utterly inconvenient. At some point, I hope they can rectify the situation so you can adequately hole up in there." Again, there's not malice to her tone. In fact, she's ready to leave him be. She even smiles at him and readies herself to move on when he orders the fruit.

Martha pauses to watch. She was curious how it would go. Okay, specificities were necessary. And then she catches his faces as he takes a bite.

"That bad eh? I wonder what planet those are from."

"Not sure they're actually a real anything," Bucky muttered, a reluctant smile again tugging at the corners of his mouth. "Food is food, though. Not gonna waste it. Here's hoping it is edible."

He took another bite, and controlled his reaction better this time. Having grown up first in the Depression and then in the deprivation caused by the war, Bucky had an inherent horror toward the idea of wasting food.

From her words and body language he thought she was preparing to leave him alone. Even though that was what he'd wanted, for nobody to be here... now that she was here, he found he didn't mind so much. Since she wasn't trying to corner or touch him.

"You don't have to go," he said gruffly. "You should at least try to get your tea sorted out. I can't... I shouldn't hide in my room forever." Even though that was exactly what he'd done in Romania. But there, he'd been a wanted man. Here, nobody cared who he was.

"Oh you'd be surprised. It all depends on the species make-up you see. There's this one alien on this little planet I once visited and all their food is just sour. Completely and totally sour. At least it is to me. For them, it's... well I don't actually know how it is. But they love it."

He doesn't look thrilled with it, but he's also not wasting it, which tells Martha a lot about him. "Better or worse than rat? Or are you one of the lucky people who never had to scrounge for rodents?" Because she had. Walked across the world and

She nodded in response to his statement and moved to a replicator a few over from him. "What black Earth teas do you have?" she asked the computer, but the list became too long to deal with. "Black teas originating in England?" Shorter... but still longer. She picked one at random. The resulting tea looked tea-like and she took a cautious sip, wrinkling her nose while swallowing.

"Extra bitter and I doubt I'll get sugar." But she'd drink it.

"Rat ain't so bad. Better than roaches." Things had gotten pretty desperate in the HYDRA labour camp, the first time he'd been captured along with the other men who had eventually become the Howling Commandos. Rat had been a delicacy to be fought over.

Hell, there had been times out in the field, in the harsh winters, where he'd have given just about anything for a stringy rat to eat. No, wasting food wasn't something Bucky would ever willingly do.

Her comments made him curious, more than just wondering why she'd had to eat rat. "One little planet? Are you part of the local crew?" He'd assumed from her clothing and her uncertainty about the food machines that she was a transplant like him. Then again, he supposed they probably didn't wear their uniforms on their time off, and with the systems as damaged as they were, anyone would be uncertain of the machines.

Martha nods. "Roaches are definitely bottom of the barrel. Only took those if I absolutely needed food." And more often than not, she went hungry in efforts to avoid them. Besides, other people needed food to.

She looks confused at his question though. "Local crew? No. I arrived today like many others did. I just... before all this, I knew someone. Met someone really with a space ship. And a time machine. He took me all over the universe."

"Time machine, huh? What I wouldn't give for one of those." To be able to go back, warn himself not to go on that fucking mission, or at least not to get near the Goddamn hole in the train... yeah, that would be worth just about anything.

He had to keep reminding himself that just because someone was a transplant, it didn't mean they couldn't be from a time or place that did have aliens and space travel. Or time travel, as the case may be. "Travelling the universe sounds pretty damn awesome. When are you from, though? You sound British, but with these translator things I guess you could be speaking Martian and I wouldn't be able to tell."

Martha nods. "It was pretty nice. Though it had it's bad times too. I'm from Great Britain as you discerned. From circa 2009. What about you?"

And no, space and time travel are not regular for her time either. She just found the right alien at the right time.

2009. No chance she'd have heard all the news reports about the Winter Soldier and the bombing in Vienna he was supposedly responsible for. Bucky relaxed a bit more.

"Nothin's all good. Sometimes you need the bad to appreciate the good more, I guess. Though some things are definitely all bad." It was hard to find much of a bright spot in the past seventy years of his life. "Funny how life screws you over that way, huh."

Taking his not-plums, he moved to one of the seating areas, perching on the edge of a bench. He picked one that didn't have a table immediately in front of it, so he wouldn't be closed in and trapped in place, but it also had seats near enough to have a conversation without being in touching distance, if she cared to join him. "Born and raised in Brooklyn, but I was in Berlin when I got taken. 2016."

Edited 2016-07-31 20:02 (UTC)

Martha sat down a table away. Comfortable talking distance without getting in his space even if it is further away than she normally would be to talk to anyone.

"Oh don't I know it. But I've found that even when the bad was really bad, it helped me out in unexpected ways later. So it's hard to discount it even though I really wish some of it had never happened."

She grins then. "Brooklyn! I actually was just living in New York before this." Which reminded her of what had just happened in New York before all this happened. All those people gone. Her face fell and she took a sip of tea to hide it.

Bucky was watching her closely, in case she made any sudden moves, so he didn't miss the change in expression. Something had upset her, maybe reminded her of something - she looked the way he felt, when he got hit with a flashback or a bad memory popping up.

"What?" His attention sharpened, and his brows drew together in concern. Then he kicked himself, because the problem was likely the obvious one. "Did you leave someone behind?"

Unlike him, most people would have ties to others, people they cared about, were worried about, who would be worried about them. Small wonder she'd be upset at the reminder of home.

"No." No, but how could she put what had happened. "No. I'm fairly certain they're all dead. No one survives a Dalek invasion. Not when their goal is to stop those who could mess up their plans. I'd forgotten. So much happened between that and being brought here."

She takes another sip of tea and coughs.

"I'm sorry. Here you are not really a people person and now I'm talking about topics that no one wants to hear even if they are people persons."

Edited 2016-07-31 23:14 (UTC)

Bucky frowned, confused. He wasn't sure what a Dalek was, but there had only been one invasion of New York that he was aware of. He'd spent a lot of the past two years frantically catching up on the decades of history he'd missed, and the Chitauri invasion had been top of most lists.

"I thought the alien invasion was in 2012? Right after..." He faltered, but forced himself to continue. "Right after they found Captain America in the ice. That was the first time he appeared in public."

Martha shook her head. "That's ahead of me. Or possibly an entirely different universe. If you never heard of the Daleks, then you can't possibly be from my universe."

Which means they've been pulled in from different universes, which is disconcerting in it's own right.

"There's been a few alien invasions. I've helped stop most of them. Which is probably why we were targeted this last time."

"Well, not having heard of them doesn't mean anything," Bucky admitted with a sigh. "I kinda... missed out on a lot of world events. Y'know how people say stuff like 'what, were you buried under a rock?' That's pretty much where I was."

Buried in ice, not stone, but still far away from the world that had passed him by. Even with two years to catch up, he knew he was still missing a lot of context.

"Though, multiple alien invasions does sound like something I'd have read about at some point," he added, lips twitching in a smile. "I sure heard about the Chitauri and Loki. Different universes, huh? At this point, I'm willing to believe just about anything."

"Did you read about the Earth being in the wrong place in the sky? Seeing all sorts of other planets in the sky? Because that's what happened. We had to tow the Earth back to it's rightful spot in the galaxy."

And she knows that made the news. UNIT had been monitoring it all up until the Daleks destroyed them.

Something else he said caught her attention. "Hold on. You're not actually joking are you? About being buried?"

Bucky shrugged awkwardly, not really sure he wanted to get into it. But he had brought it up. And again, he had to remind himself that nobody here was hunting for him.

"Not buried so much as frozen. Kept in cryostasis for years at a time. I missed out on a lot... like, seventy years or so. Been free the last two years, so I was catching up. The internet may be the single most useful thing mankind has ever invented."

"Seventy years!" She counts back. "Blimey! So it was sometime in the late 30s or early 40s when you went down." A lot has happened provided his universe followed the same general path hers did. "The internet is very useful, but it's also a huge distraction. Tell me, it wasn't a group called Torchwood that had you cryogenically frozen was it?"

The question is innocent. Mainly she wants to know if he's one of Jack's.

"Early '45," he confirmed. "Captured by a Russian soldier, only they turned out to be a branch of HYDRA."

His mouth tightened as he spoke the name, and he flexed his left hand in a subconscious gesture. "Crazy bastards who played nice with Hitler until they decided they'd rather take over the world themselves, if you don't know the name. Never heard of Torchwood."

Martha shook her head. "Never heard of them, but I do know the type. Ran into a few of the take over the world types in my time. And been captured by them."

She frowns. "I'm sorry you had to go through whatever it is they did to you." He hasn't really told her anything, but she caught the mouth tighten and the flex of his hand. She heard how cagey he sounded.

When she mentioned being captured, he finally looked up and met her eyes properly for the first time. There was a dark sympathy in his expression, and his personal horror lurked behind that. Presumably she hadn't suffered to the extent her had, because she was still a fully functional, seemingly normal person.

Then again, maybe she was just stronger than he'd been, and hadn't broken. He wasn't going to judge. And any amount of pain caused by enemies was too much.

"Sorry you did, too." His voice was gruff. "Nobody should have to go through that. But hell, I guess that's what I signed up to fight for. So the world would stay free, and people wouldn't have to."

It had been hell. Even now, two years later, she still had nightmares. Still found herself hoarding food when there wasn't much of a reason to. Still found herself scanning every possible exit and trying to ascertain every possible threat when she entered a room. UNIT training had helped make her better at it. But having a lead position at UNIT also helped her heal.

Martha sipped her tea with a grimace though. "I had no choice but to stop them. And him. I was the only one who could even though I didn't sign up for it. Not then."

Edited 2016-08-07 21:30 (UTC)

Welcome to the Illyria!

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Lol I finally figured out your username

Ha! I love it, but yeah. I didn't even think about using underscores when I made it back on LJ

I'm like, 'What's a notroses?'

Yeah... underscores would have helped.

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