Podpop

[cityship]

[ooc: Newbie Helpers List | Instructions: Post your character with one post establishing them as being podpopped. Tag each other in groups of 2's, 3's, and 4's, to get some interaction to start with. If a thread doesn't already have 2 or 3 people tagged in, tag it with your character's podpop popping near the other people, rather than making a new

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[hit_girl_mindy]

Mindy Macready was used to situations that weren't going her way having a start and ending point. She can recall choices that were made that brought her to the situations that caused immediate reactions. For instance, she became Hitgirl, she fights for her life. She chose to fight against Frank D'Amico, and she couldn't just beat them up: she killed them. She chose to trust Kick ass: she loses her father.

Nowhere did it compute she attends her first day of school, then she's zipped onto a strange place, shoved into a pod of alien slime. She could hardly breathe, and she wasn't even sure where she was, so there was only one thing to do in this situation.

She broke from the pod with a fury hardly known to be possessed by ten year old girls, her eyes wild with fear and bewilderment. This was definitely too much and she wasn't sure where to turn. How could anyone get to her without her knowing? She would have known if she were being sought after, her senses hadn't gotten that dull! Her face moved from right to left, and that was enough time to realize that she was far, FAR from anything that she knew in her world.

And then Stacy, THE SHIP, started talking to her.

"No fucking way," she said shaking her head. "This sounds like something out of a geeks wet dream. A CRAPPY wet dream. What, I'm just supposed to believe I was brought here because I'm so awesome I was spared to be in some kind of save the universe scenario? I mean I'm only ten! What the fuck am I supposed to do?"

Unless this Stacy knew who she was? And even if she did, she could kick some ass, yeah, but alien ass? that was a whole different story. The idea of being gone from her world was a kick in the stomach enough. She was supposed to be starting over, acting like a regular girl and all of that. She'd done what she needed to do as hit girl, and it hadn't come without a price: daddy was gone. So now she was here, only days after all of that, trying to sell her some cock and bull story about aliens that obliterated worlds. This was just insanity.

But she'd play it cool for now. She did not like the atmosphere of this pod place and she really didn't like being naked. She'd have to get more concrete answers before she could figure out what was what.

[vissernone]

Eva tapped her husband's untouched plate with the tip of her fork, an impatient sneer on her face. "Peter, eat your dinner, for God's sake. Our son's going to be ticked off at you if you do this whole Veil of Mourning cra-"

And then she's here. Before the panic takes over, she tries to assess. Naked, but covered in enough slime and gunk to somewhat approach modesty, oddly enough. Smelling putrid, but she lived in a Hork-Bajir refugee camp and had her face shoved in Yeerk Pools, so this is nothing she cann't handle. But the disorientation and confusion - well, that'll take a minute to work out. She just was having dinner, in San Diego, California, on Planet Earth, in her own solar system, and now...God only knows.

|| You are here. || she hears, and instinct kicks in. She's used to thought-speak, but thought-speak on top of being suddenly yanked from a meal and placed in a totally new situation brings up old fears. She stretches her arms, clenches her teeth, cracks her fingers, does twenty little tiny motions to prove to herself that the voice in her head is external, and she's not been infested by another Yeerk. Once satisfied that she's not a slave again, out loud, she mutters, "as a word, 'here' doesn't mean all that much unless you explain where 'here' is, you know."

She follows the lights on the floor and recoils a bit as the strange vines dress her, but as a whole she's doing a pretty good job keeping the panic to a minimum. Years of warfare and slavery can do that to a person. Stacy fills her in on some bull about being Chosen to save worlds and be the champion of life or something to that effect. Eva's none too pleased; she and her family have done enough to save the world lately, and all it's brought them in the last year is grief and anger. But she doesn't argue with this strange, slime-covered half-sister to HAL, and instead surveys her surroundings.

She sees a little girl, maybe ten or eleven years old, nearby, and while Eva's no stranger to the danger children can possess, the kid's probably less likely to be a threat than anyone else here. Not that that guarantees anything - when her son was thirteen he fought a war. Eva smears the gunk in her hair down over her face, plastering herself with a mask of hair and slime. No need to make herself easy to recognize. "You, kid. Little girl. What's happening here? Do you know where we are? Besides 'here', because Stacy already filled me in on that little detail."

[hit_girl_mindy]

Someone was taking to her. Crap. Okay,s he klnew jhow to handle a situation like this. daddy would have always told her be unassuming, and see EVERYTHING. It was the only way to stay alive. Sure, thios woman looked as if she could be someone's mom abd she had slime like her, but it could still be a trick. She still didn't have all the details.

"A ship, I guess," she replied, her voice sounding small. "I don't even know how we got here though. Something about fighting an alien species called the Ohm. I'm still trying to get all of this slime off me. What's going to happen to us now? Where are my clothes? And why pick us? I don't understand. I want to go home!"

Yeah, that was the typical ten year old reaction, right? Whining about stupid discomfort. The REAL questions were the ones that Mindy knew wouldn't be answered by someone just out of these disgusting pods. THose she'd have to get by moving out of this humid place.

"Where are you from?" she asked.

[andyallgrownup]

Well, this certainly wasn't one of the things that Andy had ever expected to happen. One moment he was at that party that his roommate had dragged him off to against his will, and the next moment he was... somewhere. Covered in slime.

And naked. And no wallet anywhere near him, Mom was going to flip whenever he told her...

And then he realized that this place wasn't anywhere that could possibly exist anywhere. What the hell was going on?

He looked around, seeing a few people near him... one looked like a woman and the other was a little girl.

He was about to ask them what was going on when he heard a voice in his head... and now he was just standing there and staring.

[vissernone]

If Mindy thinks the cute and innocent act has Eva off-guard, she's got another thing coming. Eva's seen enough child Controllers to know better than to trust anyone until you've seen them locked in a room for three days. But she does soften a little bit, because while Mindy may be the enemy, she may also just be a scared little girl who just woke up in a profoundly unpleasant location. And that idea calls to all of Eva's maternal instincts. "I don't know where you clothes are, but if you go over to those vines they'll dress you in this plant outfit I have on. It's scary, but I don't think they'll hurt you. I don't understand either, but we'll figure this out."

She turns and sees someone watching them. He looks about her son's age. "Is there a problem, young man? Besides the obvious nudity and gunk? And would you happen to have even a clue where we are?"

[hit_girl_mindy]

Mindy looked over at the vines. Oh, that was just perfect. Its not enough that she's getting computer thoughts beamed into her head, now she has to be a part of being molested by computer appendages. Could the day get any better? She rubbed her eyes with her hand. This was all way too much.

And there was a boy here too...the same age as Dave even. Making sure to concentrate on his face and not make him feel too out of it, she touched his arm lightly.

"He looks like he just got here, and I guess the computer lady is talking to him now."

[andyallgrownup]

Andy just nodded. "Yeah... talking... in my head isn't something I'm used too..." Neither was waking up naked and covered in slime, but he figured that should be obvious.

[vissernone]

"So you heard it too. I'd guess it was a public broadcast to everyone who just crawled out of these things." He's probably not going to be able to tell her anything. He seems as confused, if not moreso, than the rest of them. Eva finds herself wishing Peter was here, his scientific mind might be able to make some sense out of the location, at least, and he'd probably be interested by Stacy.

...Peter. Oh no, what if she's dead? What if she'd just vanished? Is her depressed husband still sitting there are the dinner table, wondering where his last family member's gone off to? Is he sitting in a hospital waiting room while she conjures up slime-pods and dressing vines in an anesthetic-induced hallucination on an operating table?

Eva feels the panic building up in her and takes a deep, stinking breath and closes her eyes for a second. When she opens them, she's stern again. She motions towards the vines. "Those things'll dress you. It's creepy, but what isn't about this place? It feels like the whole place is alive, like we're inside some monster's nose or something. And I'm guessing we need to follow these lights if we're going to find out more."

She pauses, looks at the little girl and the young man. "Unless it's a trap," she adds with mocking cheerfulness. "What are your names, by the way?"

[hit_girl_mindy]

The girl shook her head. "I..I thought a lot about it, and considering the temperature and the smells in the air...well, it sounds really weird, but I think that this ship we're in is alive. I guess wherever we are, it might be beyond the kind of stuff we're used to. Well, I'm used to, anyway. I don't know where you guys are from."

She sighed, looking unsure of herself (she wasn't). "My name is Mindy, Mindy Macready. Who are you two?"

[andyallgrownup]

Andy blinked, looking down at Mindy as she talked. "... Alive...?" He shook his head. "Name's Andy Davis."

[vissernone]

"Whether or not it's alive, Stacy sounds inorganic. And if it's alive, it's massive. I think there's some law of physics, square cube law or something, that says that natural things don't tend to get that big and still be able to function without collapsing. I think, I'm not sure. My husband would know. It's probably augmented by technology, at least. And generally speaking I think the insides of giant creatures don't clothe you; they digest you."

Eva casts a sideways glance at Mindy. "Considering the temperature and smells in the air"? Definitely not an average child. But possibly just a precocious, observant one. No need to go getting herself psyched up about enemies that don't exist. Andy appears harmless, but it always does well to remember that looks could be deceiving. For an instant, it makes her sad that this is how she views children and people as young as her son. Paranoia has served her well, but it's never a pleasant feeling.

Eva considers giving them a fake name, or telling them that they don't need to know hers, but that would look pretty deeply suspicious and you never want to start up an unnecessary lie, because those get difficult to remember. "I'm Eva. From California."

[hit_girl_mindy]

Eva from California. Not a lot of info there. Looks like she wasn't the only one that was trying to hide some things about herself. The boy though, he was probably just that. He seemed to be as confused as anyone else might be if they had been brought on a ship like this. In any case, she could ease into this "little girl" thing as long as she continued to act like she had no idea why she was here.

"I don't think any of us new people know how big it is," Mindy said. "But it just feels like its alive, doesn't it? I'm not saying it makes any sense, or why anyone would put us on an alive ship but what else would explain it talking in our heads and stuff?"

[andyallgrownup]

"That... does make some sense," Andy said. "But we're not going to learn anything staying here, are we?"

[vissernone]

"Follow the bright fleshy lights," Eva sing-songs under her breath to the tune of 'Follow the Yellow Brick Road'. "And that makes no sense, but if life's taught me anything it's that sense is both incredibly valuable and extremely rare. It's been nice meeting you both, but I think I'll try and find someone who has some answers now."

She'll also be watching Mindy from a distance until the reach the meet-and-greet, partially because she thinks she's hiding something and partially because a ten year-old could probably use someone watching out for her.

[hit_girl_mindy]

"I don't really know where to go," Mindy said, pouring a little of the child anxiousness on. She hardly saw a reason NOT to do this: what she did, who she was, was a secret anyway. She didn't know any of these people from the man on the fucking moon, and there was still no proof this wasn't some kind of set up. Paranoia could be unhealthy, but it kept you alive. She'd leaned that much from her father's death.

She paused at hearing what Eva said, and gave her a grin. "Wizard of Oz. Nice."

[andyallgrownup]

Andy just shook his head at that. "Let's just hurry up and hope we get some answers."

And with that, he started walking forward towards the lights.